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BX 9225 .W4 N5 1924 

Ninde, Edward Summerfield, 
1866-1935. 

George Whitefield, prophet- 
preacher 


Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2022 with funding from 
Princeton Theological Seminary Library 


https://archive.org/details/georgewhitefieldOOnind 


GEORGE WHITEFIELD 
PROPHET—PREACHER 


By | 
EDWARD S. NINDE 





THE ABINGDON PRESS 
NEW YORK CINCINNATI 


Copyright, 1924, by 
EDWARD S.NINDE 


All rights reserved, including that of translation into 
foreign languages, including the Scandinavian 


Printed in the United States of America 


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BY THE SAME AUTHOR 


THE STORY OF THE AMERICAN HYMN 





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STATUE OF WHITEFIELD, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA 


IN REVERENT MEMORY OF 
MY PARENTS 





CHAPTER 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 
IRR RACH mcr atin eur Aniek, ty nomen e hrc iota 11 
CHRONOLOGICAL OUTLINE OF WHITEFIELD’s Lire 13 
IBORNeAN DL DORNCAG AIN : Lange oy nine pater pan ie 15 
IRS TOV EEN TURES set vey hls leiedatig fe hen kee maa 25 
ATIFANDMNGDARKNESS lia onde nue NI ny 35 
LWA PINGEIN TOLLE AME con cube) anoh we sien lacie Rtn Wee ae 45 
ENE RIRS EEN TH Ey oRGA ora ey un ein yee sn ote he ai 55 
Pe OViss OF MGHILDREN ssh seid hat eit ys dae rhs: 
‘VHEsV OICR OF A, PROPHET ice ee. es 89 
Tue Bririsu IsLes FoR CHRIST.............. 99 
RANGING AND HuntTING IN AMERICA.......... 125 
WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER..... Th eae 159 
VVHITERIELD (CH Ba DAN Sr ost) 40s cute esha 181 
WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT... 25.2... 00500055. 197 





Ill. 


Vic 


VII. 


VIII. 


IX. 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


FACING 
PAGE 


Bronze statue of George Whitefield, by Dr. R. Tait 
McKenzie. Erected in 1919, in the dormitory triangle 
of the University of Pennsylvania, by Alumni of the 
Institution who were ministers and laymen of the 
MethodistyChurchyints ce te ernie eit ane Frontispiece 


Painting of Whitefield, at the age of twenty-seven, by 
Woolastan; in the National Portrait Gallery, London. 
GOpyrigh Cec Veet tales Sree ees eee eactelees hus ernie Rtie platy 48 


From a drawing of Savannah, made in 1734, a little before 
Whitefield’s first visit. Courtesy of the New York 
PTD UCELADEALY 4 ceria red he ores Aceh aed Seno geen ooe aha te 65 


The Tottenham Court Chapel, with front addition; erected 
for Whitefield, in London, in 1756. From a drawing 
EOD SOUL TAG ae coheed pereine Men SHI EN tnph ey ALARMS. fF 111 


Second page of an autograph letter written by Whitefield 
from London on March 25, 1762, to “‘Mr. Read.’’ 
Photographed from the copy in the library of the 
Historical Society of Pennsylvania.................. 122 


News items concerning Whitefield inserted by Benjamin 
Franklin in his Pennsylvania Gazette of November 29, 
1739, and May 1, 1740. Photographed from the Gazette 
in the library of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 
Whenever Whitefield was in the neighborhood of Phila- 
delphia, Franklin’s paper was full of references to him.. 134 


A section of Whitefield’s autograph Journal, in the Library 
of the Princeton Theological Seminary. Photographed 
by courtesy of Dr. J. H. Dulles, Librarian............ 146 


The old Philadelphia Court House on the right. The bal- 
cony was one of Whitefield’s favorite preaching-places. 
From a rare print in the collection of the Historical 
DOCIeLVEOLLLCONSYVLVAlIa rites eset eet arte eel os 162 


On the left is the ““New Building,” in Philadelphia, where 
Whitefield’s Charity School—forerunner of the Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania—was first held; and where he 
OLLENSPLeaChednwiec ieee ieee idly ere Ma erel ove Seater 162 


XIV. 


Vi 


XVI. 


XVII. 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


FACING 
PAGE 


Whitefield’s Field-Pulpit, from which he preached more 
than 2,000 times; now in New York, in the possession 
of the American Tract Society, by whose courtesy this 
picture was taken. The platform of the pulpit stands 
three feet above the ground; the entire framework can 
be quickly taken apart or put together. The wood is 
almost as sound as the day it was first cut........... 


Portrait of Whitefield, painted by Nathaniel Hone in 
L768 2 Oe Re IE Bre el a rota he eta tele este Gaetan Cite va oe ey ee 


Whitefield’s last portrait. Painted by Russell in 1769. 
National Portrait Gallery, London. Copyrighted..... 


The old Tennent Church, as it now appears, near Freehold, 
N.J., where Whitefield delighted to preach. This and 
the following picture are taken from “‘A Brochure on 
Old Tennent,” by kind permission of the present pastor, 
Rev. -Charles’T.). Bates, Bi Dat {We ae ee 


The old Tennent parsonage at Freehold, just before it was 
torn down in 1866. Here Whitefield used to be enter- 
tained, and here occurred the conversation on death 
referred to Im our narrative. (3... eee 


An eighteenth-century painting of the Old South Presby- 
terian Church in Newburyport, Massachusetts, where 
Whitefield often preached, and where he was entombed. 
The first house directly in the rear is where William 
Lloyd Garrison was born. The house just beyond is 
the parsonage where Whitefield died. He occupied the 
front second-story room, facing this way. For assist- 
ance in securing this and the following picture, and for 
many other courtesies, the author is deeply indebted to 
the Rev. A. McDonald Paterson, D.D., the present 
pastor of the “Ohi# South... 32.2... 


The pulpit in the Old South Presbyterian Church, New- 
buryport, Massachusetts: — 220i) sooee aoe ee 


Whitefield prepared for burial. From an extremely rare 
broadsheet issued in Boston just after the funeral, and 
now in the collection of the Historical Society of 
Pennsylvania cot) eee eee 


10 


178 


185 


199 


202 


202 


208 


209 


PREFACE 


Very little has been written on Whitefield in re- 
cent years. The standard Lives are out of print, 
and almost nothing can be obtained in the book- 
market. This, if nothing else, would seem to justify 
a new study of the great preacher’s career. 

The present volume is in no sense a full biog- 
raphy. Numerous details have been omitted, many 
of them bearing on controversial and other sub- 
jects which have little or no interest for present- 
day readers. Nor has the chronological method 
been strictly followed. 

The aim has been to bring together, in specific 
groupings, those outstanding and colorful facts 
which show the real Whitefield: the Prophet- 
Preacher who left his impress on two continents; 
and the Man of like passions with ourselves. 

The sources of information are ample. Besides 
all that his contemporaries and later writers have 
told us, we have his own “Short Account” and 
“Further Account” of his early life, his Journals 
and Sermons, and 1,465 Letters from his pen; to- 
gether with the many pamphlets he published be- 
tween 1738 and the time of his death, which throw 
light on his ministry. Happily, our American his- 
torical collections are rich in original material. 

Epwarp 8S. NINDE. 


West Chester, Pennsylvania. 
11 





CHAPTER I 
BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


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CHAPTER I 
BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


Lord Jesus, make us great proficients in the school of 
thy cross.* 


I have put my soul, as a blank, into the hands of Jesus 
Christ my Redeemer, and desired him to write upon it 
what he pleases. I know it will be his own image. 


1The quotations at the opening of each chapter are chiefly from Whitefield’s letters. 


CHAPTER I 
BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


NortHwest from London, a hundred miles as 
the crow flies, is the quaint old town of Gloucester. 
The lofty tower of the ancient cathedral looks down 
on many an historic spot. Over toward the Welsh 
hills les the hamlet where William Tyndale was 
born. In Saint Mary’s Square, under the very 
shadow of the cathedral, the stout-hearted Bishop 
Hooper died at the stake, rather than surrender his 
Protestant convictions to “Bloody Mary.” Yonder, 
in Southgate Street, in that curious timber-framed 
house, Robert Raikes, of Sunday school fame, used 
to live, while farther on is the place where he or- 
ganized the first group of children. But most in- 
teresting of all, for our present purpose, is the old 
Bell Inn, where, nine days before Christmas, in the 
year 1714, a boy was born whom his parents named 
“George,” and who became one of the mightiest 
preachers of the gospel since Apollos. 

We cannot help contrasting the boyhood advan- 
tages of George Whitefield with those of John and 
Charles Wesley. The Wesleys, born and reared 
in the tonic atmosphere of the Epworth parsonage; 
a devout father; their mother, one of the rarest 


women of that or of any age; from infancy, ideally 
17 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


trained for life’s duties. Whitefield, brought up 
in a public house, with its daily round of drunken 
brawls; when two years old losing his father; his 
mother, a sincere woman, of good intentions but 
of ordinary parts; up to his thirteenth year receiv- 
ing a very meager education, and having no ade- 
quate religious oversight. The marvel is that the 
boy did not go through life a common bartender, 
utterly unheard of beyond the borders of the town 
where he was born. 

To the end of his days, and with good reason, 
Whitefield never ceased to magnify the divine grace 
that had saved him. But under the mistaken no- 
tion that the blacker he painted himself the more 
he glorified God, he unconsciously fell into the 
habit of exaggerating his badness. During his first 
voyage to America he wrote out an account of his 
early years. If we were to accept the description 
at its face value, we would be shocked at some 
things he relates. According to his own statement, 
he was depraved from the day he was born, and as 
time went on he broke the Commandments and 
was guilty of the most scandalous conduct. And 
yet, in spite of his appalling catalogue of misdeeds, 
we have reason to believe that he was not worse, 
but much better than the average boy and young 
man in Gloucester. He was never vicious, and in 
his wrongdoing there was often a curious mingling 
of good and bad. Occasionally he stole money from 


his mother, but more than likely he hurried off to 
18 


BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


give half of it to a poor family; and when he took 
books that did not belong to him, often they were 
devotional books, 

Two centuries ago England had no regular pub- 
lic-school system, and a poor boy stood but a slim 
chance of obtaining an education. In Gloucester, 
happily, there was an endowed school, connected 
with the Saint Mary de Crypt Church. A limited 
number of boys were received, and when he was 
twelve years old young Whitefield was admitted as 
a pupil. In accord with the ideas of those days, he 
was almost at once set to work on Latin; but far 
more important, his genius on the rostrum was 
quickly seen, and he soon became the star speaker 
on all public occasions. At that time, in most 
schools, much was made of dramatic performances, 
and this mightily appealed to George. He grew 
passionately fond of reading plays and then of act- 
ing them, and more than once he neglected his other 
studies, and remained home for days at a time to 
prepare himself to take part in a school exhibition. 
Often he was dressed up as a girl, a fact that in 
after years filled him with shame and remorse. 

As he approached his fifteenth birthday he de- 
cided to leave school and go to work. Apparently, 
a university course was out of the question, and, as 
he tells us, “more learning I thought would spoil 
me for a tradesman.” So for eighteen months he 
was in the employ of his mother at the Bell Inn. “I 
put on my blue apron and my snuffers [to trim or 

19 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


extinguish the candles], washed mops, cleaned 
rooms, and, in one word, became professed and 
common drawer,” or bartender, as we would call it. 
But the lad was restless; this was not his place and 
he knew it. A divine Hand was upon him; a divine 
Voice was calling him. Mind and soul were in a 
tumult. He had all manner of conflicting expe- 
riences. One day he would be carried out of himself, 
filled with “unspeakable rapture”; the next he 
would be in the depths, yielding to sin. In a burst 
of confidence he unbosomed his heart to his sister: 
“God intends something for me which we know not 
of.” Secretly he longed to go to Oxford, for he 
had a strange feeling that he ought to be a preacher. 
It was in his blood. His great-grandfather White- 
field and his great-uncle had both been ministers, 
and in the intervals between handing out drinks he 
was composing sermons. 

One day something happened. A former school- 
mate, like George, a poor lad, had entered the Uni- 
versity. When home on a vacation, he called on 
George and his mother, and reported that he had 
just completed a term, and after meeting every ex- 
pense had one penny to the good. “Upon that my 
mother immediately cried out, “This will do for my 
son! ‘Then, turning to me, she said, ‘Will you go 
to Oxford, George? I replied, ‘With all my 
heart!’ The matter was settled then and there, 
and it marked the beginning of a new life. A week 


later he was back at the Saint Mary de Crypt 
20 


BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


School for further preparation, and within a year 
he was an undergraduate at Pembroke College, 
Oxford. 

Like his young friend, he had to earn his way. 
The great majority of the students were from 
wealthy families, but it was the custom to admit a 
few from humble homes and let them support them- 
selves by waiting on the tables of Fellows and Gen- 
tlemen Commoners. They were called “servitors,”’ 
and it is interesting to know that the father of John 
Wesley, and a number of other well-known Oxford 
graduates, belonged to this class. 

Whitefield entered college late in the fall of 1732, 
shortly before his eighteenth birthday. The Wes- 
leys had already been there for quite a time, and the 
little group nicknamed “Methodists,” or, “The 
Holy Club,” had been meeting regularly for three 
years. Whitefield had heard of them before going 
to Oxford, and he longed to know them, but a year 
passed before he obtained an introduction. At once 
he was welcomed to the society as a brother beloved. 
He had felt very lonely during the opening months. 
Socially he enjoyed no standing with the great 
bulk of the students, and the religious atmosphere 
was anything but congenial to a young man who 
wanted to be a genuine Christian. 

When Parliament passed the Act of diet artie 
in 1662, requiring all clergymen and University 
men to conform to the usages of the Established 


Church, on pain of expulsion, not only were two 
21 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


thousand of the ablest occupants of English pulpits 
driven from their parishes, but the universities also 
lost many of their finest professors and Fellows 
and undergraduates. Spiritual life at once declined 
and almost died out, and a moral lethargy that was 
utterly deadening overspread the colleges. Reli- 
gion became a mere form, and in Whitefield’s day 
even the form was sneered at. Deism was rampant, 
and it was freely said that the universities were 
“dens of infidelity.” No wonder that, with reli- 
gious restraints gone, morals collapsed. Profanity, 
gambling, and drunkenness were but outstanding 
offenses in a long train of evils. 

The one spiritual oasis at Oxford was the Holy 
Club, and fortunate was the student from 
Gloucester when he was admitted. And yet, even 
the Club could assist him only in a measure. He 
had been a nominal Christian since he was sixteen, 
if not before, but, like the Wesleys, he was to pass 
through a long and painful struggle before enter- 
ing into the full joy and liberty of a son of God. 
If there was ever a young fellow that needed reli- 
gious help, it was George Whitefield. Joln and 
Charles Wesley befriended him. ‘They were the 
soul of kindness in encouraging and counseling the 
boy, so many years their junior. But at that time 
they themselves were groping in the dark, and 
there was little they could do for others, 

What a half-decade it was, from 1730 to 1735, in 


the life of this young servitor at Pembroke! He 
22 


BORN AND BORN AGAIN 


was desperately in earnest, determined to win God’s 
favor though he perished in the attempt. He has 
left us an account of the austerities which from time 
to time he practiced. “I began to leave off eating 
fruits and such like. . . . I always chose the worst 
sort of food. ... My apparel was mean. I wore 
a patched gown and dirty shoes.” For a long while 
he regularly fasted “twice a week for thirty-six 
hours together,” and “I fasted myself almost to 
death all the forty days of Lent.” He deliberately 
exposed himself to the cold “till part of one of my 
hands was quite black.” “My continued abstinence 

. so emaciated my body that I could scarce 
creep upstairs.” In his weakened state he became 
subject to terrifying hallucinations. “Whole days 
and weeks have I spent in lying prostrate on the 
ground,” writhing under satanic torments. At last 
his condition grew so serious that his tutor was 
alarmed and called a physician. No wonder that 
the tutor, as well as the friends in Gloucester when 
they heard of these things, were sure the young man 
had gone mad. He was not mad, but he was strug- 
gling toward the light, and he had not yet learned 
to say: 

“In my hand no prite I bring; 
Simply to thy cross I cling.” 


He thought he could earn his own way, and he 
failed. 
When his agony of soul was at the limit, help 
23 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


came from an unexpected source. In 1678 a young 
clergyman by the name of Henry Scougal died in 
Scotland. He was only twenty-eight, but he had 
lived long enough to write a book entitled The Life 
of God in the Soul of Man. In these days both the 
writer and his book are almost unheard of, but God 
used that little volume in a wonderful way. It 
fell into the hands of Charles Wesley, and proved 
such a blessing to him that he passed it on to his 
friend Whitefield. As the young man read, the 
light began to dawn and he saw where he had blun- 
dered. “God soon showed me that ‘true religion 
was a union of the soul with God, and Christ 
formed within us.’” Then “a ray of divine light 
was instantaneously darted in upon my soul, and 
from that moment, but not till then, did I know that 
I must be a new creature.” Whitefield dated his 
actual conversion about seven weeks after Easter, 
in the year 1735. A few months before he died, he 
said: “I know the place. . . . Whenever I go to 
Oxford, I cannot help running to the spot where 
Jesus Christ first revealed himself to me, and gave 
me the new birth.” Henceforth he was indeed a 
new man. The haunting fears, the self-torture, the 
morose temper, were gone. He was jubilant in 
the peace and comfort of a simple faith in Jesus 
Christ. No wonder that to his dying day the New 
Birth held the supreme place in his thought and in 
his preaching. 


24 


CHAPTER II 
FIRST VENTURES 


Christ is the believer’s Hollow Square; and if we keep 
close in that, we are impregnable. Here only I find my 
refuge. Garrisoned in this, I can bid defiance to men 
and devils. 


Our senses are the landing-ports of our spiritual ene- 
mies. When Eve began to gaze on the forbidden fruit 
with her eyes, she began to long after it with her heart. 


CHAPTER II 
FIRST VENTURES 


W HITEFIELD was victor, but he bore the scars of 
conflict to the close of life. ‘There can be no doubt 
that the ill health from which he suffered more or 
less all through the years was due in part to the 
harsh way he treated his body while at Oxford. 
As an immediate outcome he was compelled to leave 
college in May, 1735, and return to Gloucester for 
nine months of recuperation. But while he rested 
he was not idle. He talked with a number of young 
people, and a society for prayer and Bible study 
was formed for those who, like himself, were eager 
to become more proficient Christians. Every day 
he called on the poor and the sick, and he made fre- 
quent visits to the county jail. He read many valu- 
able books, and did his best to grow strong in soul 
as well as in body. 

As we have already seen, when a mere boy, be- 
fore he ever went to Oxford, George had a strange 
presentiment that some time he would be a 
preacher. Quite innocently he chanced one day to 
mention this to his mother, but the good woman, 
regarding it as a bit of youthful arrogance, ex- 
claimed: “What does the boy mean? Pri thee hold 


thy tongue!’ But after entering college the divine 
27 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


call grew so clear that every doubt vanished. ‘The 
only question then was, When should he take the 
step? He wanted to delay till he was at least 
twenty-three. He was in mortal fear lest he enter 
the sacred work prematurely. The matter came to 
an issue rather unexpectedly toward the close of his 
rest period. Happily, the Bishop of Gloucester 
was Doctor Benson, a man of spiritual devotion as 
well as good sense. Unbeknown to Whitefield he 
had kept an eye on him for some time, and was 
greatly pleased with the youth. Sending for him 
one day, he announced that he would gladly ordain 
him to the ministry whenever he wished. ‘The 
young man was in a tumult of desire and dread. 
He was only twenty-one. He longed to enter on 
what he knew would be his life-work, but was he 
ready ? 

He could never forget the wrestling of those 
critical days. In one of the last sermons he 
preached in London, only a year before his death, 
he said: “I never prayed against any corruption I 
had in my life, so much as I did against going into 
holy orders. I have prayed a thousand times till 
the sweat has dropped from my face lke rain, that 
God, of his infinite mercy, would not let me enter 
the church before he called me. I remember once in 
Gloucester—I know the room; I look up at the 
window when I am there and walk along the street; 
I know the bedside, and the floor upon which I 


prostrated myself, and cried: Lord, I cannot go! 
28 


FIRST VENTURES 


I shall be puffed up with pride, and fall into the 
condemnation of the devil. I am unfit to preach 
in thy greatname. Send me not, Lord, send me not 
yet!” But the Lord sent him at once, and White- 
field never ceased to be grateful that at least one 
of his prayers had not been answered. 

He was ordained deacon on June 20, 1736, and 
“When the bishop laid his hands upon my head, I 
offered up my whole spirit, soul, and body, to the 
service of God’s sanctuary.” The following Sun- 
day he preached his first sermon, not, as we might 
have expected, in some out-of-the-way rural com- 
munity, but right there in Gloucester, in the ancient 
Church of Saint Mary de Crypt, where he had been 
baptized and had grown up as a boy. No wonder 
the town was stirred. Could it be that this young 
fellow, who but a short time before had been mop- 
ping floors and handing out drinks, or picking up 
a little knowledge in a charity school, scarcely bet- 
ter than one of the rabble—that he was now within 
a few days of receiving a bachelor’s degree from 
Oxford University, that he was already a deacon 
in the Church of England and authorized to speak 
as an ambassador of Almighty God? 

How the people flocked to the church! Of course 
the mother was there, trembling but joyous, and the 
rest of the kindred, and the old-time friends and 
neighbors and schoolmates, and a host of others, 
eager to see and hear. When it was all over, the 


young preacher wrote to a friend: “Curiosity, as 
29 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


you may easily guess, drew a large congregation 
together. The sight at first a little awed me; but I 
was comforted with a heartfelt sense of the Divine 
Presence, and soon found the unspeakable advan- 
tage of having been accustomed to public speaking 
when a boy at school, and of exhorting and teaching ~ 
the prisoners, and poor people at their private 
houses, whilst at the University. By these means 
I was kept from being daunted overmuch. As I 
proceeded I perceived the fire kindled, till at last, 
though so young, and amidst a crowd who knew me 
from my childhood days, I trust I was enabled to 
speak with some degree of gospel authority. A few 
mocked, but most for the present seemed struck; 
and I have since heard that a complaint has been 
made to the bishop that I drove fifteen mad. The 
worthy prelate, as I am informed, wished that the 
madness might not be forgotten before the next 
Sunday.” 

This first sermon in the marvelous series of eigh- 
teen thousand that fell from those eloquent lips, 
was thoroughly characteristic of the man. “He 
preached like a lion,” exclaimed one of his hearers. 
On the Saturday preceding this memorable service, 
Whitefield said to a friend: “I shall displease some, 
. . . but I must tell them the truth, or otherwise 
I shall not be a faithful minister of Christ.” Fear- 
less, fervent, tenderly persuasive and with heav- 
enly unction, thus the twenty-one-year-old preacher 


began his ministry, and thus he went on. A few 
30 


FIRST VENTURES 


days later he was back in Oxford, where he received 
his degree of Bachelor of Arts. Many of his friends 
urged him to accept a parish in or near Gloucester, 
but the university town appealed to him more 
strongly. The Wesleys were in Georgia, and the 
work of the Methodists, so dear to his heart, had 
seriously declined. Here seemed to be the greater 
need, and nowhere was it more pathetic than among 
the inmates of the Oxford jail. 

As we read the story of those early days, we are 
constantly impressed with the intense concern that 
Whitefield and his fellow Methodists felt for the 
prison unfortunates; and well they might. In some 
respects civilization had made striking advances, 
but in the treatment of crime and criminals Eng- 
land was still ‘back in the Dark Ages, and the 
grossest barbarities were practiced. People were 
thrust into jail on the flimsiest pretext and with 
little regard to their innocence or guilt. More than 
two hundred offenses, many of them extremely 
petty, were punishable with death. At times the 
gallows became so glutted that criminals whom the 
overworked hangmen could not attend to were 
shipped off to penal colonies. It was an open ques- 
tion whether the gibbet or transportation was not 
preferable to remaining in prison. Jail conditions 
were frightful. ‘The wardenship was sold to the 
highest bidder, and the one who obtained it was out 
for the last shilling he could make. There was no 


pretense of providing adequate ventilation. Every 
31 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


window in a building was taxed, and as the warden 
had to pay for the jail windows, he saw to it that 
only enough were put in to save the inmates from 
suffocation. Picture prison cells, with men, women, 
and children, the beastly and the innocent, huddled 
together; the foulest immoralities; earth floors, 
sometimes covered with an inch of water, swarming 
with rats and vermin; an open sewer running 
through the center; the dead bodies of criminals 
allowed to lie near by till the stench rose to high 
heaven; some of the inmates mere skeletons from 
lack of food; others locked in with fellow-prisoners 
down with smallpox; many sick and dying with 
the dreaded “jail-fever,” human beings with im- 
mortal souls, almost as neglected religiously as if 
they had been cattle. At one time John Wesley 
was so stirred that he wrote a letter of protest to 
the London papers: “Of all the seats of woe on this 
side of hell, few, I suppose, exceed or even equal 
Newgate”; but there were a number that did even 
exceed Newgate. 

Is it any wonder that such tragic and pitiful con- 
ditions mightily appealed to the little Oxford 
brotherhood, and that when Whitefield learned that 
in the absence of the Wesleys the prison work was 
lagging, he longed to get back and urge it forward? 
Nothing these young men ever did was more des- 
perately needed and had more of the Christ spirit 
in it than the visitation of the jails. Whitefield’s 


opportunities were limited, but at least he was able 
32 


FIRST VENTURES 


to do something around Oxford; he could counsel 
and pray with the prisoners, and he could use funds 
intrusted to him for the purpose, in helping those 
who had been put in jail for petty debts. He was 
thoroughly happy in his work, and he’ fully ex- 
pected to be busied in these and in similar activities 
for several years. But God had other plans. 

In the midsummer of 1736 there came urgent 
word for him to hurry to London, to serve for a few 
weeks as supply curate at the Tower. He hesi- 
tated; he had never been farther away than Oxford. 
London—the vast metropolis! A thousand mis- 
givings filled his mind. But the call was impera- 
tive and he went. His experiences there were not 
altogether delightful. He tells us that as he 
“passed along the streets, many came out of their 
shops to see so young a person in gown and cassock; 
and one cried out, “There’s a boy parson!’ which 
served to mortify my pride.” He preached his first 
Sunday morning sermon in Bishopsgate-street 
Church. As he went up the pulpit stairs he felt 
decidedly uncomfortable, for “almost all seemed to 
sneer at me on account of my youth.” But he had 
not been speaking many minutes before both he and 
his hearers became absorbed in something more im- 
portant than age. No doubt Whitefield was un- 
usually boyish-looking at this time, but Doctor Gil- 
lies, who for years was his intimate friend, tells us 
he was “graceful and well proportioned. His stat- 


ure was rather above the middle size. His com- 
33 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


plexion was very fair. His eyes were of a dark blue 
color, and small, but sprightly. He had a squint 
with one of them, occasioned either by the ignor- 
ance or carelessness of the nurse who attended him 
in the measles, when he was about four years old. 
In his youth he was very slender, . . . but about 
the fortieth year of his age he began to grow corpu- 
lent.” 

He remained in London only a couple of months, 
but this was enough to give him a certain self-con- 
fidence and home-feeling, as well as standing, in the 
great city where, through the coming years, he was 
to do such a mighty work. His preaching in 
churches and prisons made so deep an impression 
that people from all over London flocked to hear 
him. When he went back to Oxford, once more he 
expected to settle down, but again the Divine Will 
intervened. For a few weeks he helped a friend in 
a rural parish, and then, in December, almost on his 
twenty-second birthday, he took the momentous 
step which led him out of the regular ministry. 
Henceforth he was to be missionary and evangelist- 
at-large. 


34 


CHAPTER III 
A LAND IN DARKNESS 


The Lord empties before he fills; humbles before he 


exalts. 


All the promises of the Gospel, all that is said of God 
and Christ, can do us no good except that God and Christ 
are ours. ‘The devils can say, “Oh God!” but the devils 
cannot say, ‘““My God!” ‘That is a privilege peculiar to 
God’s chosen people. 


CHAPTER III 
A LAND IN DARKNESS 


To appreciate the significance of the religious 
movement in which Whitefield and the Wesleys 
were the outstanding figures we must bear in mind 
conditions in England two hundred years ago. At 
no time in the history of the Island Kingdom were 
morals and religion more deeply submerged than 
in the opening decades of the eighteenth century. 
When Charles the Second came to the throne, in 
1660, the popular reaction from the stern measures 
of Cromwell was swift and fierce. Led on by high 
society, the nation went in for a “wide-open”’ pol- 
icy. Soon there came the notorious Act of Uni- 
formity, foolish as it was unjust, which in one day 
drove from their parishes nearly two thousand rec- 
tors and vicars, the very men who at Oxford and 
Cambridge, in London and in all the leading towns 
throughout the land, represented the highest learn- 
ing and devotion of the church. It was intended 
as a body blow to Puritanism, but tenfold worse 
was its deadening effect on Conformity itself. 

As the years went by, spasmodic efforts were 
made to improve the situation, but gradually almost 
the entire nation seemed to settle down into an easy 
complacence, which, had it not been broken, would 


have proved fatal. The effect on public morals 
37 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


was ruinous. Crime became rampant and un- 
checked. The streets of London swarmed with 
desperate characters, many of whom the timid and 
ofttimes decrepit constables were afraid to arrest. 
Robberies and hold-ups were so constant that Lon- 
don almost ceased to be a civilized town. 

The crime mania invaded the higher as well as 
the lower circles. The Mohock Club was made up 
entirely of young villains from “polite” society. 
They were accustomed to sally forth after an eve- 
ning of hard drinking, to engage in their favorite 
sports. Some would “tip the lion,” which amiable 
pastime consisted in seizing a passer-by and squeez- 
ing his nose flat on his face, and gouging out his 
eyes with their fingers. Or they might turn “danc- 
ing-masters,’ and, forming a circle around their 
unhappy victim, stimulate him to vigorous capers 
by pricking his legs with their swords, till he fell ex- 
hausted at their feet. Woe to the women who were 
caught! Well for them if they escaped with simply 
being shut up in barrels and rolled down the rocky 
steep of Snow Hill. The street perils were so great 
that no one who could afford it thought of going 
out at night without a strong bodyguard of retain- 
ers, armed to the teeth. Traveling in the country 
was equally dangerous. Highway bandits, well- 
trained in robbery and murder, infested the roads. 
As late as 1751 Horace Walpole wrote, “One is 
forced to travel even at noon as if one were going to 


battle.” 
38 


A LAND IN DARKNESS 


Drinking and drunkenness were well-nigh uni- 
versal, and were regarded as quite the proper thing. 
When Robert Walpole and his father would sit 
down together for a carouse, the elder was accus- 
tomed to pour out a double draught for his son, 
saying, “Come, Robert, you shall drink twice while 
I drink once; for I will not permit the son in his 
sober senses to be witness of the intoxication of his 
father.” But some years later, when Robert was 
prime minister, he himself felt no shame in being 
seen drunk. His political foe, Lord Bolingbroke, 
would sit up all night drinking, and in the morning 
bind a wet napkin about his head, and then, when 
sufficiently sobered, hurry off to his official duties, 
without a moment’s sleep. It would be interesting 
as well as instructive to know how far English pol- 
icies both in home and in world affairs, through a 
long and critical period, were determined by states- 
men befuddled with liquor. 

The drink-habit among the poor knew no limit. 
Never was it more widespread than at the very time 
when Whitefield was acting as bartender at the 
Bell Inn. Gin had been introduced and all were 
calling for it. In London every sixth house was a 
saloon. In front of them signs were placed, offer- 
ing to make a man drunk for a penny, dead-drunk 
for twopence, while down cellar straw was spread 
out where the wretches might sleep off their de- 
bauch. The nation was almost drowned in liquor. 


At one time the total output reached an average of 
39 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


two or three barrels annually for every man, 
woman, and child in the realm. And yet the people 
cried for more, still more! ‘The ruinous effects be- 
came clearer every day. Crime and immorality 
steadily increased; the birth-rate declined; tens of 
thousands were sick and dying from diseases di- 
rectly caused by drink. Sensible men became 
alarmed. Doctors and others who realized the havoc 
that was being wrought, freely predicted that the 
nation itself would be destroyed unless the evil was 
checked. Restraining laws were passed, but they 
accomplished little. A mightier cure was needed, 
and that cure no Parliament could provide. 

If gambling was less common than drinking, it 
was merely because it was a form of luxury that 
only the well-to-do could afford to indulge in to 
any extent. But Swift assures us that it was “the 
bane of English nobility.” It led to the permanent 
injury, if not the complete downfall, of some of the 
nation’s most gifted leaders. 

But no curse of that degenerate age left in its 
train such deep and ghastly marks as did the vice 
of immorality. It invaded all classes of society, 
high and low. ‘The royal household was a notorious 
offender. Eminent servants of the state, even a 
prime minister, were quite willing to appear at the 
theater with their mistresses. The courtly Lord 
Chesterfield thought it proper to instruct his son 
in “the art of seduction as part of a polite educa- 


tion.” Personal purity and domestic fidelity were 
40 


A LAND IN DARKNESS 


laughed at as altogether impossible, if, indeed, de- 
sirable. The average theater of to-day may not be 
an ideal place for the saints, but it is a paradise in 
comparison with the playhouses of Whitefield’s 
boyhood. At that time shows of such a character 
were presented that ladies who were determined to 
witness them and whose sense of modesty was by 
no means fastidious, were impelled to wear masks 
to conceal their identity. On the drawing-room 
tables of fashionable homes were books by popular 
authors of the day, books that were freely read in 
parlor gatherings with many a jocose comment and 
with no trace of shame, yet so foul that in these 
times no decent person would think of touching 
them even in the privacy of his own chamber. If 
there is any lingering doubt as to the indecencies 
tolerated two hundred years ago, one has only to 
take from the library shelf of the British Museum a 
huge portfolio of broadsheets and handbills, such 
as were once commonly distributed, but so obscene 
that anyone who attempted to put them out at the 
present time would speedily find himself behind 
prison bars. 

We are not surprised that in the period which 
we are studying there were gross scandals in re- 
gard to marriage. The laws respecting this solemn 
- compact were extremely lax, and almost any couple 
that desired could be wedded without delay. There 
were “marrying parsons” then as now, but the 


brand was the lowest of the low. Most of them, 
41 | 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


while claiming to be priests, were men of infamous 
lives, ready to stoop to any abomination. One was 
reported to have married an average of six thou- 
sand couples a year, while another boasted that he 
had performed one hundred and seventy-three cere- 
monies in a single day. In most instances the con- 
tracting parties had known each other less than a 
week, and very often only a few hours. In many 
cases the whole thing was done—put through very 
likely by designing persons—when one or the other 
or both parties were drunk, and what was their as- 
tonishment and dismay, when awaking, to find that 
unwittingly they had entered into an alliance so 
ironclad that it could be dissolved only by special 
act of Parliament! ‘The untold miseries that were 
entailed can readily be imagined. 

We pause now to ask, Where was the church all 
this time? What was she doing? England pro- 
fessed to be a Christian nation; there were ten thou- 
sand clergymen and millions of communicant mem- 
bers, and a vast establishment, the growth of cen- 
turies. Then why this moral degradation? The 
answer is simple: in large measure the church had 
lost her power. Not that the nation was utterly 
depraved, for both in pulpit and pew were men 
eminent for godliness, but their number was com- 
paratively small. Upon the land as a whole there 
rested, like a dismal pall, a moral and spiritual leth- 
argy. When Bishop Butler wrote his famous 


Analogy he declared that “it had come to be taken 
42 


A LAND IN DARKNESS 


for granted that Christianity is not so much as a 
subject for inquiry; but that it is now at length dis- 
covered to be fictitious”; and such was the religious 
indifference that no one cared. On his return to 
France in 1731, after two years in England, 
Montesquieu reported that the English people had 
no religion, that when the subject was mentioned in 
higher social circles it excited mirth, and that not 
more than four or five members of the House of 
Commons were regular attendants at church. Top- 
lady, author of “Rock of Ages,’ and himself a 
clergyman of the Established Church, declared that 
in his own communion “a converted minister was 
as great a wonder as a comet”; and Isaac Watts 
assures us the situation among the Dissenters was 
likewise deplorable. It is no exaggeration to say 
that “the English clergy were the idlest and most 
lifeless in the world.”* Their standard of conduct 
was extremely low. Men who ought to have been 
in prayer or at study or visiting their flocks, too 
often were fox-hunting or, far worse, gambling and 
drinking. Intoxication was a prevalent vice among 
them. On a certain occasion the Bishop of Chester 
rebuked one of his clergy for drunkenness. 

“But, my lord, I never was drunk on duty.” 

“On duty!’ exclaimed the prelate; “‘and pray, sir, 
when is a clergyman not on duty?” 

“True; my lord,” said the other; “I never 
thought of that.” 


z 1Green’s A Short History of the English People, page 739. 
43 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Even Lord Bolingbroke, notorious as a gay liver 
and an infidel, was scandalized by what he saw all 
about him. “Let me seriously tell you,” said he, 
pointing the finger of scorn at a recreant clergy- 
man, “that the greatest miracle in the world is the 
subsistence of Christianity, and its continued pres- 
ervation as a religion, when the preaching of it is 
committed to the care of such un-Christian men 
as you.” 

Is it any wonder that the pulpit in those days was 
for the most part utterly dead? It was out of the 
question for such men to condemn sin or to assail 
the glaring evils of the age. As a rule, their ser- 
mons were colorless essays, barren of any vital re- 
ligion, and read in a spiritless manner. At a still 
later date Sir William Blackstone, the eminent ju- 
rist, visited all the leading churches in London, and 
“heard not one discourse which had more Christian- 
ity in it than the writings of Cicero.” 

If there was a period in all her history when Eng- 
land and her sons everywhere needed the message 
of a veritable prophet of the Lord, it was in those 
critical decades of the eighteenth century. We will 
search in vain the annals of all time for a clearer 
evidence of the presence of God in the affairs of 
men than we find in the appearance, at the hour of 
supreme need, of Whitefield and the Wesleys as 
the prophetic leaders in that religious movement 
which turned England and America upside down 


and left a permanent impress on the whole world. 
44 


CHAPTER IV 
LEAPING INTO FAME 


The bank of heaven is a sure bank. I have drawn 
thousands of bills upon it, and never had one sent back 
protested. 


Be much in secret prayer. When you are about the 
common business of life, be much in ejaculatory prayer. 
Send, from time to time, short letters post to heaven, 
upon the wings of faith. They will reach the very heart 
of God, and will return to you loaded with blessings. 


CHAPTER IV 
LEAPING INTO FAME 


In October, 1735, the Wesley brothers sailed for 
Georgia, John as a missionary to the Indians, and 
Charles as secretary to General Oglethorpe, gover- 
nor of the colony. The following summer, while 
supplying in London, Whitefield received letters 
from his friends across the sea, describing the field 
and the need of more workers. He longed to join 
them, and had he been left to himself, would prob- 
ably have embarked in the first boat bound for 
Savannah. But all to whom he mentioned his de- 
sire insisted that such a step would be rash; at least 
he must wait for a clearer opening. He patiently 
bided his time. 

Early in December word came that Charles 
Wesley had unexpectedly arrived in England, 
seeking recruits; and a few days later letters 
reached Whitefield from John Wesley, praying 
that God would speedily send helpers. “What if 
thou art the man, Mr. Whitefield? . . . Do you 
ask me what you shall have? Food to eat and rai- 
ment to put on; a house to lay your head in, such as 
your Lord had not; and a crown of glory that fad- 
eth not away.” “Upon reading this,” says White- 
field, “my heart leaped within me, and, as it were, 


echoed to the call.”” The question was settled there 
47 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


and then. In Charles Wesley’s Journal, under date 
of December 22, 1736, we find this brief but mo- 
mentous entry: “I received a letter from Mr. 
Whitefield, offering himself to go to Georgia.” 
The young man expected to embark at once, but 
unlooked-for delays arose. The ship was not ready; 
and then Oglethorpe, who was to be in charge of 
the outgoing party, for various reasons kept post- 
poning the date of departure, so that a whole year 
elapsed before they finally sailed. But not a mo- 
ment was wasted; the time of waiting was Basle 
with events of tremendous importance. 

It was during this period that Whitefield really 
“found himself.” He fairly leaped into fame, and 
his name became a household word. What an amaz- 
ing change a few months wrought! In June we 
find him wrestling in prayer that his ordination may 
be delayed; he has one lone sermon; he feels he must 
have at least a hundred before he will dare to begin 
preaching; he ventures into the pulpit for the first 
time, with quaking limbs. The weeks pass, and 
soon we see him delivering sermons day after day 
in the leading churches with all the abandon of a 
veteran; he fairly exults; the king has come to his 
throne. 

He journeyed in triumph from place to place. 
He made a brief visit to his old home-town of 
Gloucester and preached to crowds. “I began to 
grow a little popular,” is his naive comment. He 


went on to Bristol, at that time the second largest 
48 





WHITEFIELD AT TWENTY-SEVEN 


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_ LEAPING INTO FAME 


city in Kngland, and the clergy vied with each other 
in urging him to occupy their pulpits. He also 
preached before the mayor and the Corporation at 
their insistent request. A few weeks later he was 
in Bristol again, preaching five times a week. “It 
was wonderful,” he wrote in his Journal, “to see 
how the people hung upon the rails of the organ 
loft, climbed upon the leads of the church, and made 
the church itself so hot with their breath that the 
steam would fall from the pillars like drops of rain.” 
The throngs were so dense that he could scarcely 
make his way to the pulpit. When he left, at the 
end of the month, multitudes were in tears, and he 
slipped out of town in the small hours of the morn- 
ing, to avoid the great company that had intended 
to follow him on horseback and in coaches. 

He several times visited Bath, England’s most 
fashionable resort. ‘The notorious “Beau” Nash 
was the undisputed dictator of the place, but this 
did not hinder the young Methodist itinerant from 
being repeatedly invited to preach in the cathedral 
pulpit, where his sermons created a mighty stir 
among the élite hearers. 

He nowhere made a deeper impression than in 
London, where he spent several months. As a rule, 
he preached nine times a week, but he could not be- 
gin to meet the calls that poured in upon him. He 
was busy from early till late. “On Sunday morn- 
ings,” he tells us, “long before day, you might see 
streets filled with people going to church, with their 

49 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


lanterns in their hands, and hear them conversing 
about the things of God.” The crowds were so 
great that constables were stationed at the church 
doors to keep order. “The sight of the congrega- 
tions was awful. One might, as it were, walk upon 
the people’s heads, and thousands went away from 
the largest churches for want of room. They were 
all attention, and heard like people hearing for eter- 
nity.” Soon the tide of enthusiasm ran so high that 
“T could no longer walk on foot as usual, but was 
constrained to go in a coach, from place to place, 
to avoid the hosannas of the multitude. They grew 
quite extravagant in their applauses, and, had it 
not been for my compassionate High Priest, popu- 
larity would have destroyed me. I used to plead 
with him to take me by the hand, and lead me un- 
hurt through this fiery furnace. He heard my re- 
quest, and gave me to see the vanity of all com- 
mendation but his own.” 

There is something deeply pathetic in the artless 
account which the young man gives of his immense 
popularity, and of the determined effort to remain 
true to his best self and to God while passing 
through what was indeed a “fiery furnace.” Re- 
member that it was less than six years since White- 
field was a common bartender, without the slight- 
est prospect of anything better in life. Neither he 
nor any of his friends dreamed that he would ever 
be heard of beyond the borders of his native town. - 


And yet, lo and behold! a mere stripling of twenty- 
50 


LEAPING INTO FAME 


two, he now stands before the world an alumnus 
of a renowned university; though only a deacon in 
the opening year of his ministry, he is filling some of 
the greatest pulpits of the land, and receiving the 
plaudits of the people as no preacher has done for 
generations. Whitefield was human, intensely hu- 
man. We are drawn to him all the more because 
he was a man of like passions with ourselves. ‘The 
marvel is not that, in spite of all his efforts to hold 
steady, there were times when he became somewhat 
inflated, but, rather, that he was not ruined by his 
popularity. True, the multitudes, high and low, of 
every denomination, thronged his ministry, but 
what went they out to see and hear? A mere artist 
in human speech? A juggler of moral phrases? 
A dispenser of soft words? Nay, verily, but a 
prophet of the Lord! Be it said to Whitefield’s 
everlasting credit, that from his first sermon to the 
end of his career, whether in cathedral or in field, 
in cottage or in palace, before the great or the 
lowly, he preached what he believed to be the eter- 
nal verities of the faith. Wiuithout fear or favor he 
condemned sin and exalted righteousness. 

Is it not singular that in the very year, 1737, 
when Whitefield was in all his glory and passing 
through a “fiery furnace” in his endeavor to keep 
humble, Wesley was over in Georgia, feeling the 
heat of quite a different sort of furnace, as he en- 
-dured one of the bitterest trials of his life? It 


seemed to him that the mission into which he had 
51 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


put his very soul had been a failure and worse than 
a failure. In spiritual agony he cried, “I went to 
America to convert the Indians, but, Oh! who shall 
convert me?” ‘Though more than eleven years 
Whitefield’s senior, he had not yet entered into the 
rich experience which the younger already en- 
joyed. Presently he was to receive that baptism of 
power which would make of him a new man; but in 
the meantime he was groping in the dark, while the 
boy preacher was marching through the land with 
the shout of triumph. As a matter of fact, it was 
Whitefield, and not Wesley, who first introduced 
Methodism to the world; who, by his marvelous 
preaching, set people to thinking and talking about 
this strange thing; who aroused both curiosity and 
enthusiasm, and who prepared the way for the still 
mightier work which was to be done by the favored 
sons of the Epworth manse. 

Those were happy days for Whitefield, and no 
wonder; but it was not all joy. If he had friends, 
there were likewise enemies. Already might be 
heard the first mutterings of that opposition which 
would presently become fierce and malignant, and 
which would follow him to the end of his life—and 
beyond. In caricature and through warnings in 
the press his foes were beginning to stir up the peo- 
ple against him. The truth was that his preaching 
was too plain. Unconverted ministers did not en- 
joy sermons on the New Birth. The laymen might 


stand it, but the clergy were soon in torments. And 
52 


LEAPING INTO FAME 


more than this, he was altogether too friendly with 
Dissenters. ‘To be sure, he himself was a member 
of the Established Church, but he saw no reason 
for despising good men who happened to belong to 
some other communion. In these and in sundry 
other ways he disturbed the peace of mind of many 
people. 

So we are quite within bounds in suspecting that 
when, from time to time, he reiterated his intention 
to go to Georgia—a wilderness as far removed from 
England as two or three times the circumference 
of the globe in these days—the news brought de- 
cided relief to some troubled hearts. Never for a 
moment, during the year of waiting, had his pur- 
pose wavered. True, his mother was heartbroken, 
and friends reminded him that if he wanted to con- 
vert Indians he could find suitable subjects at 
Kingswood, where the colliers were as wild and sav- 
age as any red-skins in America. And there were 
others who would sorely miss him. ‘T’wo hundred 
years ago the only chance that a poor boy in Eng- 
land had to obtain an education was at one of the 
Charity Schools that philanthropic individuals and 
organizations had founded. Whitefield could never 
forget his own humble home and his early struggle 
for knowledge, and wherever he had preached and 
permission was granted, he made an appeal for the 
support of these schools. In this way he had col- 
lected a thousand pounds, a very large sum when 


we remember the value of money at that time. 
53 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


But all the while he was restless. His heart was 
beyond the sea and he longed to be off. At the very 
close of this eventful year sudden word came that 
the ship in which he was to sail was about to leave, 
and immediately he went on board. They pro- 
ceeded as far as Deal, where they were detained for. 
several weeks, and here a singular thing happened. 
On the morning when the ship was to weigh anchor 
and continue its voyage, a vessel from America 
crept into the harbor, with John Wesley on board. 
Great was his astonishment to learn that Whitefield 
was just sailing. At once he cast lots, and con- 
cluded that the young man ought not to go, and 
he hurried off a brief note advising him to return 
home. ‘Then, without waiting for an answer, he 
landed, and started post-haste for London. He 
had had a bitter time in Georgia and he hoped that 
no friend of his would risk a similar experience. 
But in this case, Wesley, usually so wise in counsel, 
seriously blundered. We dread to think what the 
consequence would have been, for England as well 
as for America, if Whitefield had yielded and aban- 
doned his mission. Happily his mind and heart 
were fixed. God had called him; he knew it; and 
with no trace of misgiving he went straight for- 
ward. 


54 


CHAPTER V 
IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


I lead a pilgrim life; God give me a pilgrim heart! 


We must be made perfect by sufferings. If we do not 
meet them in our younger days, we shall certainly have 
them in the decline of life. Trials, at such a season, are 
like the finishing strokes of the limner’s pencil. They 
serve, in the hands of the Holy Spirit, to complete the 
new creature, and make it fit for heaven. 


CHAPTER V 
IN PERILS IN THE SKA 


BETWEEN the opening of 1738 and the close of 
1769 Whitefield crossed the Atlantic thirteen times. 
It is doubtful if this record was equaled by anyone 
not a seafaring man. In the eighteenth century no 
one thought of taking an ocean voyage for mere 
pleasure; it was serious business. Very few crossed 
the sea even once, and still fewer risked it a second 
time. 

Great was the contrast between the mammoth 
liners of our own day, of nearly sixty thousand 
tons, and nearly one thousand feet in length, racing 
back and forth in five days, at almost railroad 
speed, heedless of storm or calm, and the small ves- 
sels that Whitefield knew! Sir Francis Drake cir- 
cumnavigated the globe with five ships, the largest 
of less than one hundred tons and the smallest of 
only fifteen. In the middle of the eighteenth cen- 
tury many ships regularly engaged in the trans- 
Atlantic trade were of less than fifty tons burden. 
Doubtless those in which Whitefield sailed were 
larger, but at best they were mere cockle-shells. No 
matter how staunchly put together, the constant 
buffeting of wind and wave would soon start the 


seams. ‘The experience of a certain Captain David 
57 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Lindsay was a common one. He was four thousand 
miles from his home port in Rhode Island, and his 
tiny brigantine of forty tons in bad condition. 
After surveying her he made the gloomy comment: 
“My vesiel will not last to proceed farr. We can 
see day Lite al round her bow under deck.” But 
he must get back to America in some way. He 
made a few patches and then started. It was a 
voyage of months, and for twenty-two days a storm 
raged without ceasing. ‘The sails were torn to tat- 
ters and floods of water poured in at the open 
seams; but somehow they finally limped into port. 

Whoever ventured on the great deep took his life 
in his hands, and the cry to man the pumps was al- 
most as familiar as the call to raise or lower the 
sails. On the contrary, a long-continued calm 
might be as serious as a storm. Many are the tales 
of horror, where food and water gave out and the 
hapless crews suffered torture worse than death. 
More than this, there were dangers from enemy 
ships. We must bear in mind that during a good 
part of the eighteenth century England was at war 
with France and Spain, and in spite of oc- 
casional peace treaties there was not a day from 
1700 to 1763 when English ships were safe at sea. 
Privateers swarmed everywhere, ready to swoop 
down on a defenseless merchantman, sinking the 
ship or taking it into port as a prize, and throwing 
the crew into prison. 


Those were indeed perilous times. No wonder 
58 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


that in the church services the prayer for sailors was 
recited most fervently, and that in every hymn book 
were oft-sung petitions for those out on the “vast 
and furious” ocean. 

And then not only were there serious dangers. 
As a rule, a sea voyage was anything but comfort- 
able. The towering “castles,” fore and aft, which 
were the familiar features of earlier ships, had been 
considerably cut down in Whitefield’s time, but the 
only sleeping accommodations worth the name were 
still at either end. Imagine being cooped up in 
such a place for two or three months! Very likely 
the captain is a tyrant, the crew mutinous, and the 
passengers anything but congenial. When the 
weather is fair one may walk the deck for a few 
paces, but for weeks at a time the passengers are 
shut below while the small craft is swept by the 
waves. Again and again the bunks are swamped, 
and if it is winter there is the freezing cold and no 
fire. After the first few days the provisions begin 
to grow stale, and they do not improve as the 
tonths pass. 

Picture the discomforts and the perils, and then 
think what it must have been to make the venture 
thirteen times. Happily, Whitefield was a good 
sailor; some of his voyages were comparatively 
pleasant; and, best of all, he never for a moment 
doubted that he was on the King’s business. But 
in following his career, we do well not to overlook 


the real heroism of the man, who, like the apostle 
59 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


of old, could say of himself that ofttimes he was 
‘in perils in the sea.” 

As nearly as we can estimate, Whitefield was 
actually at sea for a total of seven hundred and 
thirty-two days, or almost exactly two years. This 
does not include the weeks he spent at anchor in 
harbors, waiting for favorable winds, or the various 
trips along the American and English seaboard. 

The voyages to this side were almost always 
longer than those in the opposite direction. As is 
well known, the prevailing winds are from the west, 


and for the old-time sailor, with his unwieldy craft, 


it was hard work to get across. Asa rule he had to 


fight his way mile by mile, and he used to talk of 


going “uphill to America.” Whitefield’s longest 
voyage took just eleven weeks, and was made in 
1744, from Plymouth to York, Maine. His short- 
est trip was when he returned to England for the 
last time, in 1765. He was on a fast boat, with 
good winds, and he landed in twenty-eight days. 
Some of his experiences he could never forget. 
“On December 28, 1737, I left London and went 
on board the Whitaker’; thus he wrote. What a 
memorable day! For a whole year he had been 
waiting and longing to start, and now was his 
chance. ‘The Spaniards in Florida had been threat- 
ening the Georgia colonists, and it was decided to 
send over a regiment of British soldiers to protect 
the Englishmen. A company was to sail on the 


Whitaker, and Whitefield was to go along as chap- 
60 


Eee 


& ele, te a 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


lain, and on reaching America he would take 
charge of the parish of Savannah, to which he had 
been assigned. Before embarking he spent many 
hours in prayer with his friends, and they attended 
the holy communion together. It was a solemn 
time for the young cleric. The ship stopped at 
several points on the way down the Channel, being 
detained three weeks at Deal. Whitefield went 
ashore nearly every day, and frequently preached 
and held services of prayer. 

On February 2 they finally left the English 
coast. The little vessel was packed to the gunwales 
with its human cargo. In addition to the crew, 
more than a hundred people, including a number of 
women and children, families of the soldiers, were 
on board. Every nook and corner was full, and 
it was indeed a motley crowd. Never was a young 
preacher of twenty-three put to a sterner test than 
was George Whitefield, and, be it remembered, 
never did one meet the test in a nobler and more 
triumphant spirit. 

When he embarked at London the officers, both 
of the sailors and of the soldiers, looked upon him 
as an impostor; he was such a boy in appearance; 
and at first they were inclined to snub him. It was 
a critical situation. A tactless word or attitude 
would have ruined him for the whole voyage; but 
he carried himself with perfect self-poise. He 
neither cringed nor domineered, but in a quiet, 


manly spirit he went straight forward and did his 
61 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


work, and very soon the general opinion began to 
change. 

On the first Sabbath “nothing was to be seen but 
cards, and little heard but cursing and blasphemy. 
T could do no more for a season than, whilst I was 
waiting, now and then turn my head, by way of 
reproof, to a lieutenant of the soldiers, who swore 
as though he was born of a swearing constitution.” 
He intimated to the military captain that he would 
be glad each day to use a short collect before the 
officers. “After pausing a while and shaking his 
head, he answered, ‘I think we may, when we have 
nothing else to do.’ ” 

Whitefield was not in the least discouraged. He 
at once began holding morning prayers on the deck, 
let come who would. He seized every chance to 
preach to the soldiers, and organized groups of 
them and also of the women for special instruction. 
He was tireless in his attention to the sick. One 
night, early in the voyage, a terrific storm burst 
upon them, and the waves broke through the hatch- 
way and poured down upon the terrified pas- 
sengers. The little ship was on her beam-ends, and 
in great peril. Whitefield writes: “I arose and 
called upon God for myself and those that sailed 
with me. . . . Then, creeping on my hands and 
knees, I went between decks, and sang psalms with, 
and comforted the poor wet people.” He adds the 
interesting item that, in the midst of all the uproar, 


“IT was enabled to finish a sermon before I went to 
62 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


bed, which I had begun a few days before, and was 
never more cheerful in my life.” But even White- 
field was mortal, and though he prided himself on 
his qualities as a sailor, he does admit “being a little 
sick by the late shaking of the ship, and the heat 
and the smell of the people between decks.” 

He was alert to every opportunity to say some- 
thing for his Master. In his Journal we constantly 
meet references like these: “Breakfasted with some 
of the gentlemen in the great cabin, who were very 
civil, and Jet me put in a word for God”; “Had an 
hour’s conversation with a gentleman on board 

. on our new birth in Christ Jesus’; “Gained an 
opportunity, by walking at night on deck, to talk 
closely to the chief mate, and one of the sergeants 
of the regiment, and hope my words were not alto- 
gether spoken in vain’; “About eleven at night 
went and sat down among the sailors in the steer- 
age, and reasoned with them” concerning the Chris- 
tian life. His unswerving loyalty to his calling, 
and his uniform courtesy and kindness of spirit, 
soon won for Whitefield the respect and friendship 
of everyone on board. Nor were they slow to rec- 
ognize the extraordinary ability of their young 
chaplain. Soon both captains were begging him 
to regularly conduct morning and evening prayers 
on deck, and he did so, with a captain standing 
on either side and the soldiers massed around 
him. 

Two boats, the Amy and Lightfoot, also carry- 

63 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


ing soldiers, accompanied the Whitaker, and when 
the sea was smooth, Whitefield often visited them 
and held service. Now and then the three ships 
would draw close together, everyone crowded to the 
decks, and he would preach, his magnificent voice 
easily being heard by the entire audience. What 
scenes those must have been! Nor did he deal in 
soft things. One day his subject was, “The Eter- 
nity of Hell Torments,” and he adds, “I was ear- 
nest in delivering it, being desirous that none of 
my dear hearers should experience them.” We may 
well believe he was “earnest,” for the sermon made 
a tremendous impression. On another occasion he 
preached against drunkenness. It never seems to 
have occurred to him to experiment with total ab- 
stinence, for without the least hesitation he informs 
us that on this very voyage he was taking along, 
for the use of his future parishioners, “two hogs- 
heads of fine white wine.” Drinking was universal 
in those days. But drunkenness he abhorred, and 
the temperance orator never lived who could pic- 
ture it in more startling colors. 

In all ages, profanity, especially among soldiers 
and sailors, has been a besetting sin. Whitefield 
lost no chance to deal it a body blow. He well 
knew whom he was hitting, but he was utterly fear- 
less, and his words reached the mark. One day, at 
the close of a sermon, Captain Mackay asked the 
soldiers to stay, and then he humbly confessed to 


them that he had been a notorious swearer, but that 
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IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


through the influence of Whitefield’s preaching 
“he had now left off, and he exhorted them, for 
Christ’s sake, to go and do likewise.” 

The Whitaker and her companions stopped at 
Gibraltar, to take on more soldiers and sailors, and 
then they made for Savannah, where they arrived 
on May 7. Long before the voyage was ended a 
complete transformation had been wrought on ship- 
board. Not an oath was heard, many of the soldiers 
and sailors had been soundly converted, and in the 
great cabin, where the officers met, religion was a 
daily subject of conversation. Such was the spirit- 
ual triumph of this young preacher on his first voy- 
age, utterly inexperienced in such company but 
filled with the Holy Ghost. 

Four months later he was on the sea again, re- 
turning to England to receive his final ordination. 
As he set sail he prayed, “Lord, send us a prosper- 
ous voyage!’ But his faith was to be sorely tested. 
The winds were so contrary that for days they 
scarcely got out of sight of land. ‘Then storm fol- 
lowed storm. In one tempest the sails were “torn 
all to tatters! not a dry place was to be found in all 
the ship. ‘The captain’s hammock was half filled 
with water. ... All was terror and confusion.” 
The fresh provisions and several barrels of fresh 
water were swept overboard. After they had been 
out five weeks, each person was put on a daily al- 
lowance of water. On October 30, Whitefield 


_ wrote in his Journal: “Our ship’s company are now 
65 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


brought into great straits. Their allowance of 
water is a quart a day, and our constant food for 
some time has been salt beef and water-dumplins, 
which do not agree with the stomachs of all 
amongst us.” Five days passed: “Our allowance 
of water is now but a pint a day, so that we dare 
not eat much beef. Our sails are exceeding thin, 
and no one knows where we are; but God does, 
and that is sufficient.” Four days later: “Most of 
us now begin to be weak, and look hollow-eyed. 
Yet a little while and we shall come to extremity.” 
Another three days and he writes: “An ounce or 
two of salt beef, a pint of muddy water, and a cake 
made of flour and the skimmings of the pot, is my 
daily allowance.” But relief was at hand. In less 
than twenty-four hours the coast of Ireland was 
sighted. As soon as possible a boat was sent 
ashore, and presently came back loaded with water 
and provisions. 

Happily, on this return voyage to England very 
few persons were on board besides the crew. Had 
there been a large company, the suffering would 
have been tragic. When it was all over, Whitefield 
wrote: “The voyage has been greatly for my good; 
for I have had a glorious opportunity of searching 
the Scriptures, composing discourses, writing let- 
ters, and communing with my own heart. We have 
been on board just nine weeks and three days. .. . 
My clothes have not been off (except to change 
me) all the passage. Part of the time I lay on 

66 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


open deck; part on a chest; and the remainder on 
a bedstead covered with my buffalo skin.” He had 
to content himself with somewhat simple religious 
services, but the power was there. One day as he 
was preaching, the captain of the ship was so deeply 
convicted that he cried out, “Lord, break this hard 
heart of mine!” Captain Gladman, whose ship 
had been wrecked on the Florida coast, was on 
board as a passenger, and was soundly converted. 
He gave up a seafaring life to devote himself to 
religious work, and became one of Whitefield’s 
traveling companions. Best of all, the young 
preacher himself gained a personal experience, a 
deepening of his faith and trust in God, that en- 
riched his whole after-life. 

Immediately on landing he received every kind- 
ness. A gentleman on a near-by estate hurried to 
his relief and provided him with horses for the jour- 
ney across Ireland. When he reached Limerick, 
the Protestant Bishop, though an entire stranger, 
greeted and entertained him with affectionate hos- 
pitality. Whitefield preached in the cathedral, and 
the next day, as he was leaving, “the good Bishop 
kissed me, and said: ‘Mr. Whitefield, God bless 
you! I wish you success abroad. Had you stayed 
in town, this house should have been your home.’ ”’ 
He rode on to Dublin, where he was also treated 
with every courtesy. Many of the church leaders 
had heard of him and were deeply interested in the 


young missionary. ‘Then across to England and 
67 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


on to London, where his old-time friends gave him 
a joyous welcome. 

In spite of perils and hardships Whitefield thor- 
oughly enjoyed the ocean. From the time he was 
at Oxford he was never robust, and during much of 
his life he was almost constantly on the verge of 
physical collapse. The change of scene, the sea 
air and the relaxation did him immense good, and 
often in his letters, when feeling unusually worn, 
he expresses his longing for another voyage. Or- 
dinarily, his sea experiences were more common- 
place than when he came to America and returned 
the first time. He made full use of his leisure in 
study and meditation. He was always gathering 
new thoughts and illustrations for sermons. For 
example, he writes in his Journal: “To-day we were 
entertained with a most agreeable sight. It was a 
shark about the length of a man, which followed our 
ship, attended with five little fishes, called the pilot- 
fish, much like a mackerel but larger. These, I am 
told, always keep the shark company. And what is 
most surprising, though the shark is so ravenous a 
creature, yet let it be never so hungry, it never 
touches one of them. Nor are they less faithful 
to him. For, as I was informed, if the shark is 
hooked, very often these little creatures will not 
forsake him, but cleave close to his fins, and are 
often taken up with him. Go to the Pilot-fish, thou 
that forsakest a friend in MER consider his 


ways and be ashamed.” 
68 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


He was also an indefatigable correspondent, es- 
pecially for an age when letter-writing was by no 
means as common as it is now. On his way to 
America the second time he wrote more than sixty 
letters, which were ready for the post when he 
reached Philadelphia. It was a rather expensive 
luxury for an itinerant missionary. A mail went 
from Philadelphia to England once a month. It 
cost a shilling to send a single sheet, and four shil- 
lings to send an ounce. 

Reference has already been made to the fact that 
the longest time Whitefield was ever at sea was 
eleven weeks, when he made his third visit to Amer- 
ica, In 1744. He was now married and his wife 
was with him. He had planned to leave in June, 
but at the last minute word came from the captain 
of the vessel in which he was to embark, that, as 
Whitefield put it, “he would not take me, for fear 
of my spoiling his sailors.” Evidently, the news 
was out in maritime circles that whenever White- 
field boarded a ship a revival followed, and it made 
some captains extremely uneasy. But finally, in 
August, the evangelist and his wife set sail. 

It was a time of great danger. England was at 
war with France, and as a measure of precaution, 
one hundred and fifty merchantmen started out 
together, convoyed by a number of war vessels. In 
a short time the fleet began to break up, some going 
in one direction and some in another, while White- 
field, on board the Wilmington, and still under 

69 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


convoy, made direct for New England. As was 
his invariable custom, on embarking he had begun 
holding “regular public prayer morning and eve- 
ning, frequent communion, and days of humilia- 
tion and fasting.” All this was within his province, 
for he was chaplain of the ship, but most chaplains 
were hopelessly remiss. One day the Wilmington 
collided with a smaller boat and nearly sank her. 
“A little while after,” writes Whitefield, ““we came 
up with the convoy, and our captain informed them 
of what had happened. The answer was, “This is 
your praying, and be damned to ye!’ This, I must 
own, shocked me more than the striking of the 
ship.” 

Again and again the alarm was sounded that 
the enemy was in sight. On one occasion two ships 
were seen approaching under full head of canvas, 
and the captain was sure they were French men-of- 
war. Whitefield afterward wrote to a friend: 
“The preparations for an engagement were for- 
midable. Guns mounting, chains put about the 
masts, everything taken out of the great cabin, 
hammocks put about the sides of the ship. . . . My 
wife, after having dressed herself to prepare for 
all events, set about making cartridges.” At first 
Whitefield went below decks, being told that was 
the usual place for the chaplain, presumably to help 
in caring for the wounded. “But not liking my 
situation, ... I crept up on deck, and for the first 


time of my life beat up to arms by a warm exhorta- 
70 


IN PERILS IN THE SEA 


3 


tion.” It was a false alarm, however, the ships 
proving to be friends. But though this danger was 
escaped, one storm followed another, and the voy- 
age as a whole was one of the most trying White- 
field ever made. The memory of it lingered with 
him all through life. 


am 


oo 





CHAPTER VI 
A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


I hope to grow rich in heaven by taking care of or- 
phans on earth. 


It is better to be a saint than a scholar; indeed, the 
only way to be a true scholar is to be striving to be a 
true saint. 


CHAPTER VI 
A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


On the ship that brought Whitefield to America 
the first time were several children belonging to 
the soldiers’ families. The young chaplain became 
very fond of them and they of him; but he required 
absolute obedience. One day a little fellow, four 
years old, refused to say the Lord’s Prayer. Such 
obstinacy would never do. Whitefield forced him 
to his knees and gave him “several blows,” and 
then, after he had conquered, he rewarded the child 
with some figs. On another occasion a small boy 
misbehaved at a public service. The chaplain or- 
dered him to be tied with cords, and required him 
to learn the penitential wail of David, the fifty-first 
Psalm, and to recite it before the entire ship’s com- 
pany; and not till then was he unbound. 

We might infer from such incidents that the 
young preacher was unduly severe in his treatment 
of children, though it is more than likely that his 
methods would fully have commended themselves 
to so wise and experienced a disciplinarian as Su- 
sannah Wesley. At all events there can be no 
doubt that he was of an unusually warm and affec- 
tionate nature, and we know that children made a 
peculiar appeal to him. As we shall presently see, 


all this had a distinct bearing on his entire ministry. 
75 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Of his married life we shall speak more fully 
later on, but one incident calls for notice in this con- 
nection. On February 9, 1744, he wrote: “Who 
knows what a day may bring forth? Last night I 
was called to sacrifice my Isaac; I mean, bury my 
only child and son, about four months old.” The 
father had looked forward to the coming of the 
baby with eager anticipation; it had been the sub- 
ject of constant prayer. He fondly hoped and be- 
lieved that the child would be a boy, that he would 
grow to manhood and become a preacher. White- 
field was very happy in the thought “of having a 
son of my own so divinely employed.” When the 
baby was a week old the father “publicly baptized 
him, and in the company of thousands, solemnly 
gave him up to that God who gave him tome. A 
hymn, composed by an aged widow, as suitable to 
the occasion, was sung, and all went away with big 
hopes of the child’s being hereafter to be employed 
in the work of God. But how soon have all their 
expectations been blasted, as well as mine!” 

It was a bitter disappointment. But if White- 
field had no one of his own flesh and blood to follow 
in his steps, he enjoyed the extraordinary privilege 
of seeing scores, if not hundreds, of spiritual sons, 
on both sides of the Atlantic, enter the ministry, 
and many of these grew up from childhood at his 
very feet. 

Wherever he went he was constantly seeking 


trophies for the Master from among the children. 
76 


A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


One day, on his first visit to Boston, he was preach- 
ing to a great congregation. Governor Belcher and 
many other notables were present. He says, “I 
think I never was so drawn out to pray for little 
children, and invite them to Jesus Christ.” He 
had just been told of a child who had heard him 
preach, and some time afterward had been taken 
sick and died, and who, as the end came, whispered 
to his mother, “I will go to Mr. Whitefield’s God.” 
“This encouraged me to speak to little ones; but, 
oh, how were the old people affected, when I said, 
‘Little children, if your parents will not come to 
Christ, do you come, and go to heaven without 
them.’ There seemed to be but few dry eyes. I 
have not seen a greater commotion during my 
preaching at Boston.” 

This was not the only time that Whitefield used 
a child to give added strength to an appeal. On 
one occasion, as he was holding an open-air service, 
“a little boy, about eight years of age, wept as 
though his heart would break. Mr. Cross took 
him up into the wagon, which so affected me, that 
I broke from my discourse, and told the people that, 
since old professors were not concerned, God, out 
of an infant’s mouth, was perfecting praise; and 
the little boy should preach to them.” 

Wherever he went Whitefield made an indelible 
impression on the child-mind. In 1835, when Doc- 
tor Stearns became pastor of the Old South Church 
in Newburyport, beneath whose pulpit Whitefield 

77 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


is entombed, he found an aged woman who vividly 
remembered the great preacher. She used to tell 
in particular of a Sunday morning when, the gallery 
being full of children, he suddenly paused in his 
sermon, and spreading out his hands, beckoned to 
the boys and girls, and called the “dear little birds 
to come and fly to the arms of their Saviour.” The 
manner of the appeal, of which only a Whitefield 
was master, so thrilled his young hearers that they — 
could not forget it to their dying day. 

Some of his most beautiful letters were written 
to children. One of his youthful correspondents 
lived in Boston, a certain “John D.,” and in 1741 
Whitefield wrote him from Scotland: “My dear 
Child, I thank you for your letter. I neither forgot 
you nor my promise. O that God may effectually 
work upon your heart betimes, for you cannot be 
good too soon, or too good. The little orphans at 
Georgia are crying out, ‘What shall we do to be 
saved? And I am glad to hear that this is the lan- 
guage of some little ones in New England. If you 
know any of them, pray give my love to them, and 
tell them that I pray that Jesus Christ may be re- 
vealed in their dear hearts. How did he love the 
little children, how did he take them up in his sacred 
arms and bless them! Let this encourage you to 
come unto him. What comfort will you enjoy! 
You will then have a heaven upon earth.” 

Instinctively children were drawn to Whitefield. 


They soon came to love and to trust him, and noth- 
78 





A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


ing could be more touching than their sympathetic 
devotion. Very often in his open-air meetings in 
England, especially in the earlier years, the rabble 
treated him roughly. At the close of a letter to a 
friend, describing some experiences through which 
he had just passed while preaching in Moorfields, 
London, he adds this: “Several little boys and girls 
who were fond of sitting round me on the pulpit, 
while I preached, . .. though they were often 
pelted with eggs, dirt, etce., thrown at me, never 
once gave way, but, on the contrary, every time I 
was struck, turned up their little weeping eyes, and 
seemed to wish they could receive the blows for 
Me. 

We cannot help thinking how different in many 
ways Whitefield’s career might have been but for 
the apparently simple fact that he was so deeply in- 
terested in children. When he crossed the ocean the 
first time and landed at the village of Savannah, 
Georgia was not quite six years old. It was the 
youngest as well as the southernmost of the Amer- 
ican colonies. Florida belonged to Spain. When 
the British government chartered the new colony, 
the primary thought was to provide a home for un- 
fortunate debtors who had been languishing in 
English prisons, and who needed a place where they 
could begin life over again. General Oglethorpe, 
one of the noblest leaders of his time, accepted the 
governorship. ‘The first shipload of emigrants ar- 


rived in the winter of 1733, and three years later 
79 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


John and Charles Wesley landed with the members 
of the fifth company. John was to be pastor of the 
little flock and missionary among the neighboring 
Indians, and Charles was secretary to the governor. 
Charles remained only eight months, but this was 
long enough to convince him that something must 
be done to provide for orphaned children. Already 
several parents had died, and the number of or- 
phans was sure to-increase, while the condition of 
the homeless waifs was pitiful in the extreme. 

When he returned to England late in the year, 
and described the situation to Whitefield, the heart - 
of that lover of children was deeply stirred, and he 
resolved that if he ever got to America, one of his 
first concerns should be to start an orphanage. As 
we have already seen, he was delayed in sailing, and 
did not reach Savannah on his first voyage till May 
7, 1738. It was a hurried trip; in four months he 
was on his way back to England, being anxious to 
receive his final ordination to the priesthood. But 
what he saw during those few weeks gave a mighty 
impetus to his plans. 

I’rom this time to the end of his life no enterprise 
appealed to him as did his orphan work in Georgia. 
He dreamed of it by night and toiled for it by day. 
His journals and letters are crowded with refer- 
ences to it. Wherever he went, in England and 
Scotland, and along the Atlantic seaboard in 
America, he was constantly presenting the claims 


of his little wards and soliciting gifts to provide for 
80 


A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


their needs. His frequent visits to Philadelphia, 
New York, and Boston were in part prompted by 
his desire for help, and he was rarely disappointed. 
More than one voyage across the Atlantic was 
made largely for the sake of the orphans. Indeed, 
it is not too much to say that his ministry, especially 
as it was related to America, was in considerable 
measure shaped by his absorbed interest in the 
homeless boys and girls whom he gathered under 
his protecting care in the Georgia colony. 

No sooner did he reach England after his first 
visit to America than he began appealing in public 
and private for the project so near his heart. By 
the middle of the summer of 1739 he had collected 
more than a thousand pounds, and he was eager to 
get back to Savannah and start the new enterprise. 
So widespread was the interest awakened that, as 
he tells us, ‘““Multitudes offered to go with me,” but 
he took only a few selected helpers. 

In forming his plans he was strongly influenced 
by the accounts he received of the great orphanage 
which Professor Francke had founded at Halle, in 
Germany, where two thousand children were cared 
for, and whose fame as a model institution was 
world wide. ‘To plant something of this kind on 
American soil, however modest the beginning, was 
the ambition of his heart. Five hundred acres were 
granted him a few miles out of Savannah, and there 
on a March day, in the spring of 1740, while the 


workmen knelt around him in prayer, he laid the 
81 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


first bricks of the new building. “I called it Be- 
thesda, because I hoped it would be a house of 
mercy to many souls.”’ 

The rules which he laid down for the manage- 
ment of the place are interesting, not only because 
they were prepared by Whitefield, but as showing 
the ideas that most good people used to hold as to 
the proper way to bring up children. 'The orphans 
were wakened every morning at five o’clock. As 
soon as they slipped on their clothes, each one spent 
a quarter of an hour in private prayer. Then they 
all gathered in the chapel and sang a psalm and lis- 
tened to an exposition of the Scriptures. At seven 
Ken’s morning hymn was sung and a prayer of- 
fered. After that the hungry children sat down to 
breakfast, but the meal was interrupted at various 
stages for the singing of more hymns. From eight 
to ten, while the girls were busy with spinning and 
sewing, the boys drew water and chopped wood, 
and some of the more promising ones were “placed 
under tailors, shoemakers, or carpenters.” At ten 
school began, when they were taught to read and 
write. Dinner was at noon, “and between that and 
two o'clock, everyone was employed in something 
useful, but no time was allowed for idleness or play, 
which are Satan’s darling hours to tempt children 
to all manner of wickedness, as lying, cursing, 
swearing, and uncleanness; so that, though we are 
about seventy in family, we have no more noise 


than if it was a private house.” From two to six 
82 


: 





A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


was given to school work. In the evening there was 
another religious service, and a closing period of 
private prayer. 

_ Verily times change. What child in these days 
could be induced to submit to such a program as 
this? And yet the Georgia orphans were perfectly 
contented, and whatever criticism may have been 
leveled at the work, not a voice on either side of the 
Atlantic condemned the strictness of the rules. 

From the start it was Whitefield’s earnest hope 
that the orphanage might be more than a mere 
haven for homeless children. He expected to see it 
expand into an educational center. The colony was 
new and schools were almost unknown. Why 
should not Bethesda become a fountain-head of 
Christian instruction for all the southland? And 
then Whitefield had a still fonder dream, that this 
institution, founded in prayer, should prove a nur- 
sery for the Christian ministry. He hoped, as the 
years went by, to gather groups of boys who should 
grow up, at least in part, under his own influence 
and supervision, who should be taught the deeper 
things of the spiritual life, and trained to go out 
as preachers of a full gospel. 

No wonder that with these visions before him he 
sought with peculiar earnestness to bring the chil- 
dren to Christ. Some of his happiest evangelistic 
work was done at Bethesda. Scarcely had he be- 
gun when we find him writing to friends in Lon- 
don: “O what wonderful things is God doing in 

83 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


America! . . . My little orphans now begin to feel 
the love of Jesus Christ. When we came to church 
the power of the Lord came upon all. Most of the 
children, both boys and girls, cried bitterly. The 
congregation was drowned in tears. When I came 
home I went to prayer again. It would have 
charmed your heart to have heard the little ones, 
in different parts of the house, begging Jesus to 
take full possession’ of their hearts.” | 

Wherever he journeyed, by land or sea, the or- 
phans were constantly in his mind, and from the 
midst of his crowded life he took time to correspond 
with them. To many of them he was their closest 
earthly friend, and their reverent love for him was 
as touching as it was genuine. He frequently read 
to English and Scotch audiences letters he had just 
received from the children, and many a time the 
people were melted to tears, and numbers were 
converted as they listened to these simple experi- 
ences from beyond the sea. Whitefield’s letters to 
the orphans were written in a perfectly familiar 
style. He knew his young wards by name—“Dear 
Betty,” “Dear Molly,” “Dear James,” “Dear 
John’—and so on down the long roll. His mes- 
sages were always an appeal to get close to the 
Master, as when he wrote: “Dear Bekky, and is 
the Lord still striving with you? O then admire his 


patience, and give him your whole heart. IThadno | 


other end in bringing you to Bethesda, but that 


you might be brought to Jesus. . . . What sweet 
84 





A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


opportunities do you enjoy! How freely may you 
go into the woods and pour out your heart before 
the dear Jesus. How early was Samuel acquainted 
with the Lord, and why should not you be ac- 
quainted with him? ... Come then, my dear 
Lamb, and wander no longer. Away to him just 
as you are, and when you are near to God, forget 
not your affectionate friend, George Whitefield.” 

During the thirty years and more in which 
Whitefield lived to watch the progress of the work, 
hundreds of children enjoyed the blessed influence 
of the orphanage, and were trained for happy and 
useful lives. A number of the boys entered the 
ministry. And yet, in spite of all the time and 
prayer and toil that he devoted to it, in spite of the 
fact that he impoverished himself by giving more 
than two thousand pounds of his own money, the 
enterprise never quite fulfilled the high hopes of the 
founder. Its location in the extreme south, away 
from the centers of population, together with other 
circumstances, militated against a large and per- 
manent success. 

The indirect results were much more significant 
than the direct. The institution was unutterably 
dear to Whitefield, the very apple of his eye, and 
again and again it was this that lured him to Amer- 
ica. Seeking funds for its support brought him 
into close touch with multitudes of leading men and 
women on both sides of the Atlantic, while on num- 


berless occasions his sermons gained a peculiar and 
85 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


persuasive power as he told of his orphans and ap- 
pealed for help. — | 

And, still more important, Whitefield could 
never forget the humble home where he was born, 
and how he struggled for an education; and it gave 
him a tender sympathy for poor children, espe- 
cially those who, like himself, had no father to en- 
courage and help them. In the background of all 
his pleading for others was the vivid recollection of 
his own early experience. ‘Think of this man, the 
most eloquent preacher of the age, evangelist on 
two continents, year after year, through a whole 
generation, going up and down the lands, holding 
before the multitude this picture of the supphant 
orphans! He wrought better than he knew. It 
was a small thing that help should be found for 
Georgia, but how much it meant, in a day when 
philanthropies were few and social service was al- | 
most unknown, that men everywhere should be 
aroused, and that the mind and heart of the Eng- 
lish-speaking world should be turned to the needs 
and claims of neglected childhood. It is no ex- 
aggeration to say that the immense interest which 
to-day is felt in every phase of child welfare, the 
numberless institutions for the protection and train- 
ing of children, and especially the tender concern 
for the little waifs without home and parents, may 
be traced in no small part to the new spirit awak- 
ened by that royal lover of children, George White- 
field. 


86 


A LOVER OF CHILDREN 


After the death of Whitefield, in 1770, Bethesda 
met with a succession of disasters. The manage- 
ment fell into wretched hands, and the work sadly 
deteriorated. Fire broke out one night and nearly 
consumed the main building. It was partially re- 
stored, only to be completely ruined by fire and 
hurricane. For years everything was abandoned, 
and even the foundations of the old orphanage were 
plowed up. But the name “Bethesda” clung to the 
original site. In 1870, under entirely changed 
auspices, a new building for the care of children was 
erected, and it is gratifying to know that the pres- 
ent-day orphanage is on the spot so dear to White- 
field, that it is known as “Bethesda,” and that, with 
its one hundred boys, it is in a flourishing condition. 


87 


2 





CHAPTER VII 
THE VOICE OF A PROPHET 


When a soul is turned to God, every day is a Sabbath, 
every meal is a spiritual refreshment, and every sentence 
he speaks should be a sermon. Whether he stays abroad 
or at home, whether he is on the Exchange or locked up 
in a closet, he can say, **O God, thou art my God!” 


Some more coronets are likely to be laid at the Redeem- 
er’s feet. They glitter gloriously when set in, and sur- 
rounded with a crown of thorns. 


CHAPTER VII 
THE VOICE OF A PROPHET 


An unfailing feature of religious crises is the 
appearance of prophets. This has been true from 
early Hebrew times down through all the centuries. 
Two hundred years ago Engiand was well supplied 
with preachers, but among them there was no out- 
standing prophet; for while prophets are preach- 
ers, preachers are not always prophets. 

If ever the prophetic spirit was needed, it was 
in the gloom preceding the great Evangelical Re- 
vival. Reference has been made to the spiritual 
apathy of the age. To be sure, many of the clergy 
and of the laity led lives that were morally correct, 
and were everywhere regarded as exemplary 
Christians, but they were held in the grip of the 
chill formalism which was abroad in the land. No 
word in the current vocabulary struck deeper dis- 
may to men’s hearts than “enthusiasm.” From pul- 
pit and press, church leaders were constantly in- 
veighing against it. ‘To betray such a spirit in re- 
ligious work, or to permit one’s own experience to 
become tainted with it, was a most serious offense. 
Heresy, deadness, enthusiasm—all might be bad, 


but the worst of these was enthusiasm. Calm self- 
91 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


restraint, stiff compliance with conventional ways, 
alone could be tolerated. 

Some of the commonest truths of Christianity 
had been well-nigh forgotten. Even distinguished 
prelates had no conception of the meaning of the 
New Birth or justification by faith. So eminent 
a leader as Bishop Butler failed to understand how 
a human soul could enjoy the immediate personal 
guidance of the Divine Spirit. One day he hotly 
exclaimed, “Sir, the pretending to extraordinary 
revelations and gifts of the Holy Spirit is a horrid 
thing, a very horrid thing!’ And he would not 
tolerate it among his clergy. 

For the most part, the pulpits of the land were 
occupied by men with little or no religious experi- 
ence, men whose principal identification was their 
clerical garb. ‘There was no moral tonic in the 
preaching. The pulpit was cowardly. On the 
great sins of the times, such as dueling, drink, gam- 
bling and slavery, the voice of the clergy was prac- 
tically silent. The typical sermon of the day was 
a cold, unfeeling essay, with perhaps a religious 
squint, perhaps not. Even so worthy a man as the 
Reverend Samuel Wesley, father of John, tolerated 
a curate at the Epworth Church whose favorite 
topic in the pulpit was the duty of making one’s 
will. In most churches a burning, soul-gripping 
message on some great spiritual theme would not 
only have startled the hearers, it would have scan- 


dalized the more sober-minded. ‘There was but 
92 


THE VOICE OF A PROPHET 


scant sympathy in those days with the fervent cry 
of the sainted Baxter: 


“T preached, as never sure to preach again; 
And as a dying man to dying men.” 


The quite general belief that the New Birth ac- 
companied baptism, and that nothing further was 
to be expected or desired, rested like a dead hand on 
spiritual aspiration. ‘The application of the water 
was enough; henceforth little was to be feared for 
this life or the life to come. 

In the midst of this darkness and stagnation be- 
gan the new movement in which Whitefield played 
so large a part. We think of him as a preacher, 
as the orator with a matchless voice; but back of 
the voice was the soul, and greater than the orator 
was the message. ‘hose eloquent lips have been 
sealed for many a decade, but the truths they ut- 
tered will vibrate to the end of time. No doubt the 
crowds were charmed and swayed by the wonder- 
ful delivery, but this alone would never have held 
them or brought them together again and again. 
They may not have known it, but a prophet was in 
their midst. Whitefield had caught a heavenly 
vision, and he was not disobedient to that vision. 

His doctrinal teaching was simple but funda- 
mental. He was in no sense a systematic theolo- 
gian; his mind was not built that way. Now and 
then ideas crept into his thinking which were inac- 


curate, and the phrasing was sometimes crude. But 
93 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


at heart he was absolutely loyal to the old-time 
faith. ‘The dread reality of sin and the beatific real- 
ity of salvation, the pathetic helplessness and the 
dire need of man and the all-sufficiency of the di- 
vine Saviour, the barrenness of a Christless life and 
the joy and duty of Christlhke living—these prim- 
itive truths were the very soul of his preaching, 
from the first sermon to the last. 

Behind the words was his own experience; he had 
the Pauline assurance, “I know!’ ‘There was the 
fadeless memory of an hour in the old Oxford days 
when a wonderful light burst upon him, and he 
knew he was born again. He had heard the divine 
call, and with glowing conviction he could say: 


“Christ, the Son of God, hath sent me o’er the widespread 
lands ; | 
Mine the mighty ordination of the piercéd hands!” 


When he spoke, it was not a mere sermon, it was 
a heavenly message. ‘There was no spiritual arro- 
gance in his heartfelt belief that God was speaking 
through him. If he was not a foreteller, he was 
something better. He possessed the highest gift of 
the ancient prophets—he was a forth-teller, and, 
like them, he dared to say, “Thus saith the Lord!” 

John Wesley was once asked why he spoke so 
often from the words, “Ye must be born again.” 
He quietly replied, “Because ye must be born 
again!’ Whitefield was of the same mind, and this 
mighty truth, together with justification by faith, 

94 


THE VOICE OF A PROPHET 


formed the burden of his preaching. 'The second 
sermon he ever prepared, and the first to be pub- 
lished, was on “The New Birth,” and so great was 
the interest awakened that three printings were 
ealled for within a few months. Years afterward, 
referring to this sermon, he said: “I remember 
when I began to speak against baptismal regenera- 
tion, . . . the first quarrel many had with me was 
because I did not say that all people who were bap- 
tized were born again. I would as soon believe the 
doctrine of transubstantiation.”’ 

He was “the voice of one crying in the wilder- 
ness,” that forms and ceremonies, however solemn 
and beautiful, are powerless to save; that even the 
highest morality is inadequate. There must be the 
transforming touch of a Divine Hand. Such 
preaching to-day sounds almost hackneyed; in 
Whitefield’s time it was positively startling. No 
clearer evidence could be found of the sweeping 
change which has been wrought in men’s religious 
thinking during the past two centuries than the fact 
that many of the sermons by Whitefield and the 
Wesleys which produced overwhelming effects, if 
preached now, would awaken very little comment. 
Nor is there a finer tribute than this to the deep and 
genuine results wrought by the Evangelical Re- 
vival. : 

Whitefield never wavered, either in the matter or 
in the intensity of his message. Most of the clergy, 


from the country curate to the bishop on his throne, 
95 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


stormed and raved at him, and many of the laymen 
were as angry as the priests. ‘The new prophet was 
turned out of the churches and all manner of eccle- 
siastical preferments were denied him. The press 
flayed him unmercifully. Yet none of these things 
moved him. And as time went on it became in- 
creasingly evident that this message was the very 
thing that multitudes not only needed but were 
really hungry for. . People everywhere were suffer- 
ing the pangs of spiritual famine, though most of 
them were ignorant of the cause of their trouble. 
But they knew something was lacking and they in- 
stinctively felt that here was a man who could help 
them. In no other way can we explain the surging 
of the crowds to his ministry. They clung to him; 
he was rarely alone. While he was still a young 
fellow in the early twenties, in noticing one of his 
preaching tours, a newspaper casually remarked 
that “he was attended ... by sixty or seventy 
horse, so great was the love of the people to his 
person, and to his doctrine of the New Birth.” 
In later years one of the shrewdest observers of 
Whitefield’s work and of the whole Evangelical 
Movement, was George III. As is well known, 
Charles Wesley, Jr., son of the great hymn-writer, 
was a musical prodigy. He often played before the 
royal family and was on intimate terms with the 
King. Once, when they were together, after his 
Majesty had lost his sight, he said, “Mr. Wesley, 


is there anybody in the room besides you and me?” 
96 


THE VOICE OF A PROPHET 


“No, your Majesty.” 

“Then I will tell you what I think. It is my 
judgment that your good father, your Uncle John, 
George Whitefield, and Lady Huntingdon have 
done more to promote true religion in England 
than all the dignified clergy put together.” 

The old king was obtuse on some subjects, but 
he was keen enough to know that there were proph- 
ets in the land. 


97 





yy 








CHAPTER VIII 
THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


God forbid that I should travel with anybody a quar- 
ter of an hour without speaking of Christ to them. 


I am never better than when I am on the full stretch 


for God. 


CHAPTER VIII 
THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


For a year and more, prior to his first visit to 
America, Whitefield’s popularity in England was 
enormous. He was eagerly welcomed to pulpits 
great and small, and wherever he preached churches — 
were packed to the doors. Nothing like it had ever 
been seen, and the young man was commonly re- 
ferred to as “Ye wonder of ye age.” But at the 
very time when the people were shouting his praises 
the clouds were beginning to gather, and distant 
rumbling was heard, ominous if not loud. When 
he set sail, many supposed he was gone for good, 
and they gave a sigh of relief. What was their 
dismay, less than a year later, to find him back 
again, bold and aggressive as ever. But a change 
had come. He was no longer greeted with shouts. 
Everywhere churches were closed to him. At first 
three or four clergymen in London ventured to in- 
vite him into their pulpits, but soon every door was 
shut. Bristol, the second city in England, had 
witnessed some of his greatest triumphs. But now 
the chancellor plainly told him that if he dared to 
preach anywhere in the diocese, he would be excom- 
municated. | 
_ Why this revulsion of feeling? Perhaps some of 


the clergy were jealous of Whitefield’s success. 
101 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Doubtless many more were offended that this 
young “upstart” should presume to cast doubt on 
the well-established and most comfortable doctrine 
that water-baptism alone is needed to effect the 
New Birth. Such disturbing talk was not to be 
tolerated. And in other ways Whitefield was not 
quite churchly, which all added to the general vex- 
ation. Moreover, he kept a Journal of the voyage 
to Savannah, which he sent back to some friends in 
England for their private perusal, and which, un- 
fortunately, they published. It had a wide circula- 
tion, and while harmless among the select few, it 
contained comments and allusions respecting him- 
self and others never intended for the public eye, 
and which put the writer in a false light. 

In a word, Whitefield was an outcast. What 
should he do? He might go back to America, 
where his Savannah parish would gladly receive 
him; and he was now fully equipped, having been 
ordained to the priesthood. But, aside from the 
imperative need for collecting money in England 
for the orphan enterprise in Georgia, he longed to 
spend a part of his ministry in evangelizing his 
native land. 


PREACHING IN THE FIELDS 


God moves in a mysterious way. It was the 
month of February, 1739. Whitefield had gone 
up from London to Bristol only to find every 


church door shut in his face. Then he turned to the 
102 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


city prison. He would surely be free to preach 
there! But in a few days even this privilege was 
denied him. Only one opening remained. Should 
he make the venture? For a moment he hesitated, 
from no fear of the snows and bleak winds of mid- 
winter, but, would he be doing right, a priest of the 
Church of England, to risk such an unheard-of 
thing? He would! And forward he went with the 
swing of a mighty urge. 

Just out of Bristol was Kingswood Hill with its 
coal mines and the thousands of begrimed and 
neglected colliers. Here the break was made. “I 
went upon a mount and spake to as many people as 
came unto me. They were upwards of two hun- 
dred. Blessed be God that I have now broken the 
ice! I believe I was never more acceptable to my 
Master than when I was standing to teach those 
hearers in the open fields.” 

In these days, how commonplace it seems! And 
yet this was the beginning of that marvelous open- 
air ministry of Whitefield and the Wesleys and 
their followers, which, in carrying the gospel to vast 
numbers of the un-churched, did more than any- 
thing else to shatter the cold formalism of the day 
and to turn the religious world upside down. 
Whitefield started with two hundred, but soon the 
Kingswood crowds had leaped to ten thousand; it 
was no longer a venture. To be sure, it made a 
sensation—a regular clergyman, in gown and cas- 
sock, preaching under the open sky, and using, in- 

103 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


stead of the liturgy, extemporaneous prayer! And 
when they heard of it, many were scandalized; but 
God was in it. Picture Whitefield with his sur- 
passing voice, a delivery that lifted hearers out of 
themselves, and a message that shook the nation; 
think of restricting such a man to the four walls of 
a parish church! As absurd as attempting to con- 
fine a lion in a bird-cage! Here was a prophet, and 
he must have the freedom of a prophet. The young 
Elijah was now in his element; “Field preaching 
is my plan, in this I am carried on eagle’s wings.” 
It became a life-motto with him: “Mounts are the 
best pulpits and the TEENS the best sounding- 
boards.” 

John Wesley was in London at the time. By 
temperament and training he was a stricter 
churchman than Whitefield, and when the news 
reached him he was startled. “I could scarcely 
reconcile myself at first to this strange way of 
preaching in the fields; . . . having been all my 
life (till very lately) so tenacious of every point 
relating to decency and order, that I should have 
thought the saving of souls almost a sin if it had not 
been done in a church.” But he soon yielded and 
began for himself. Whitefield was delighted. “I 
went to bed,” says he, “rejoicing that a fresh inroad 
was made into Satan’s territories, by Mr. Wesley’s 
following me in field-preaching. . . . The Lord 
give him ten thousand times more success than he 


has given me!” 
104 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


Of the period from 1735, when Whitefield began 
to preach, till his death in 1770, approximately two 
years were spent at sea, nine years in America, and 
twenty-four years in Britain. Both at home and 
abroad he was an evangelist at large. Too restless 
to settle down in one place, he must constantly be 
on the move. Of course, such a roaming career was 
opposed to all church order, and Bishop Benson, 
who had ordained him, admonished him that it must 
cease. But the young man made a spirited defense 
of his course. He believed God wanted him to be 
just what he called himself, a “gospel rover,” and, 
bishop or no bishop, he would not yield. 

Unlike the methodical Wesley, whose elaborate 
itineraries were planned and executed with military 
precision, Whitefield followed the leading of the 
hour. With but little to do in organizing societies 
and directing followers, he was simply a preacher 
of the Word. As doors opened and calls came, it 
was the voice of God to him, and at once he went 
forward. 

It was in this spirit that he turned to the open 
fields. Here was his grandest opportunity on both 
sides of the Atlantic, and he made full use of it. 
His favorite scenes of action were near London. 
On the edge of the city lay the great open tract 
known as Moorfields. Formerly a swamp, it had 
been drained and otherwise improved, and now was 
a rallying ground for the rabble, who poured out 


there by tens of thousands. Wrestlers, boxers, 
105 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


- mountebanks—every sort of show, decent and in- 
decent, all found their way to Moorfields. The 
place was a stronghold of Satan, and just where 
Whitefield longed to meet the enemy. Friends 
urged him not to risk it; they warned him he would 
never come out alive, and he himself admitted it 
was “a mad trick.” But he did it, and kept it up. 
He had no fixed time for preaching; any hour 
would do, so long as he had a crowd. Once he be- 
gan at six in the morning, and soon thousands were 
packed around him. He was always prepared for 
rough treatment, and he rarely escaped. It was an 
everyday experience of which he wrote: “I was 
honored with having stones, dirt, rotten eggs, and 
pieces of dead cats thrown at me.” A portable 
pulpit had been constructed for him, which could 
be quickly taken apart and carried from place to 
place. It stood on stilts, and at best was unstable. 
Sometimes the mob would make a rush and try to 
throw pulpit, preacher, and his circle of friends, 
allin a heap. More than once Whitefield’s life was 
really imperiled. “As I was passing from the pul- 
pit to the coach, I felt my hat and my wig to be 
almost off. I turned about, and observed a sword 
just touching my temples. A young rake was de- 
termined to stab me, but a gentleman, seeing the 
sword thrust near me, struck it up with his cane, 
and so the destined victim escaped.” But, as a 
rule, the people were good-natured, and the op- 


position, though annoying, and at times malignant, 
106 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


was, after all, a mere incident in the mighty 
work. 

Here were vast multitudes, now and then a sprin- 
kling of the gentry in coaches or on horseback, 
drawn largely by curiosity, but the great mass of 
them from the very dregs of London’s population, 
the “devil’s castaways,” who rarely if ever darkened 
a church door, and who were now hearing about 
One who to most was an “unknown God.” 

What throngs! not only at Moorfields, but at 
Kennington Common, at Marylebone Fields, and 
wherever Whitefield preached in the open. Here 
are a few snatches from his Journal, describing 
some of his earlier experiences: “Preached this 
Sunday morning in Moorfields, to about twenty 
thousand people; ... and, at six, preached at 
Kennington. Such a sight I never saw before. I 
believe there were no less than fifty thousand peo- 
ple, near fourscore coaches, besides great numbers 
of horses. There was an awful silence among the 
people. God gave me great enlargement of heart. 
I continued my discourse an hour and a half.” 
“Preached at Kennington Common. God sent us 
a little rain, but that only washed away the curious 
hearers. Nearly thirty thousand stood their 
ground.” ‘“Preached at a place called Mayfair, 
near Hyde Park Corner. The congregation, I 
believe, consisted of near eighty thousand people; 
it was by far the largest I ever preached to yet. In 
the time of my prayer, there was a little noise; but 

107 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


they kept a deep silence during my whole discourse. 
. . . God strengthened me to speak so loud that 
most could hear, and so powerfully, that most, I 
believe, could feel.” 

Whitefield made large use of singing. Needless 
to say, the “gospel” variety was unknown in those 
days. Indeed, until the Wesleyan song movement 
got under way, there were not many hymns apart 
from the Psalms. But the preacher did his best 
and the crowd followed suit, and so vociferously 
that when conditions were favorable the sound 
carried two miles. Singing proved especially ef- 
fective when the people were restless, or when dis- 
turbers tried to break up a meeting. Let no one 
imagine that this open-air work was easy; it taxed 
Whitefield to the limit. Picture a crowd—tens of 
thousands, the “scum o’ the earth’; and no police 
restraint; some of them openly bent on mischief; 
others friendly, but the bulk of them of uncertain 
temper, swayed by a passing breeze. It was a fa- 
miliar experience that Whitefield alluded to, when, 
at the close of one of these meetings, he wrote to a 
friend: “I continued in praying, preaching, and 
singing (for the noise at times, was too great to 
preach) about three hours.” Hard work, but glo- 
rious! Whitefield exulted in it. He used to say: 
“T think every day lost that is not spent in field- 
preaching.” Nowhere was he so completely in his 
element. He was a born master of crowds, and 
they felt it. Rarely did they escape him. 

108 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


As time passed, his hearers were singularly 
drawn to him, and wherever he went multitudes 
became his stanch friends. Just before he sailed 
the second time for America we find this entry in 
his Journal: “Preached in the evening to near 
twenty thousand, at Kennington Common... . 
Could scarcely get to the coach for the people 
thronging me, to take me by the hand and give me a 
parting blessing.” 

An important part of these meetings, decidedly 
novel in those times, was the collection. Day and 
night the Georgia orphanage was on Whitefield’s 
heart, and next to saving souls he was bent on find- 
ing a support for his little wards. Rarely did he 
preach without bringing in an appeal for the chil- 
dren, and never lived the man who could appeal 
more persuasively than he. ‘The results were as- 
tonishing. This is a single day’s experience, taken 
almost at random: “Preached this morning to a 
prodigious number of people in Moorfields, and 
collected for the orphans £52 19s. 6d., above £20 
of which was in halfpence. Indeed, they almost 
wearied me in receiving their mites, and they were 
more than one man could carry home.” No won- 
der! Ten thousand copper halfpennies, besides 
all the larger coins; and remember that the value 
of money then was several times what it is now. 
But this was not all. That same day he “preached 
in the evening to near sixty thousand people. . . 


After sermon I made another collection of £29 17s. 
109 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


8d.,” a total of nearly £83, worth at least $2,000 
in these days, and a great part of it coming from the 
dregs of society. 

While open-air preaching, on a large scale, cen- 
tered in London, Whitefield carried it on to the 
limit of his strength, in all parts of the kingdom. 
Throughout the land he had his favorite preaching- 
places, pieces of rising ground where he could easily 
speak to multitudes; and for long years after his 
death many of these places were associated with his 
name and were known as “Whitefield’s Mounts.” 


TABERNACLE AND CHAPEL 


The results of this work were blessed and oft- 
times immediate. Whitefield used to invite those 
who wished to begin a new life to write a brief note 
and pass it up to him, and at the close of one of 
the huge London meetings, held in the spring of 
1742, he wrote to a friend: ““We then retired to the 
Tabernacle. My pocket was full of notes from per- 
sons brought under concern. I read them amid 
the praises . . . of thousands. . . . This was the 
beginning of the Tabernacle Society. ‘Three hun- 
dred and fifty awakened souls were received in 
one day; and, I believe the number of notes ex- 
ceeded a thousand.” 

The Tabernacle of which he speaks was a large 
frame shed, recently erected by some of his friends 


on the edge of Moorfields, as a protection for his 
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THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


more regular hearers in cold and rainy weather. 
The original intention was to keep it there for only 
a short time, until Whitefield returned to America; 
but it continued in use for several years, when it 
gave place to a brick building on the same spot, 
and this stood for more than a century, the center 
of an important evangelistic work. 

For a considerable time Whitefield had wanted 
a meeting-place in the more fashionable West End 
of London. There were many people of social 
quality who had heard him on some chance occasion, 
and who were eager to hear him frequently, and for 
whom he certainly had a message; but they were 
not attracted either to the open-air meetings or to 
the barnlike Tabernacle. His hopes were realized 
when, in 1756, a chapel was erected in Tottenham 
Court Road. It was of dignified appearance, with 
a dome rising to a height of one hundred fourteen 
feet. Beneath it was a vault where Whitefield 
expected to be buried, and where he hoped John 
and Charles Wesley would lie beside him. The 
chapel was spacious, but when Whitefield was the 
preacher the building could not begin to hold the 
crowds, and among the multitude that came with 
more or less regularity were many of the élite of 
London. 

In comparison with the humble Tabernacle it 
was quite an aristocratic center. But let no one 
suppose that the preacher’s message was altered one 


iota to suit the ears of his more fashionable hear- 
Tae 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


ers. Never were the dread reality of sin and the 
need of a new birth declared with more burning 
intensity. With the preaching of every sermon 
definite results were expected. ‘God is doing won- 
ders in the new Chapel,” wrote Whitefield, a few 
months after the opening. “A neighboring doctor 
has baptized the place, calling it “Whitefield’s Soul- 
Trap.’ I pray that it may be a soul-trap indeed, 
to many wandering sinners.” 

As a priest in the Church of England, Whitefield 
wanted the Chapel to be a part of the Establish- 
ment, but certain narrow requirements in force at 
the time prevented; and in order to give the work 
legal standing, the place was licensed as a Dissent- 
ing Meetinghouse. When Whitefield was in town 
he himself was usually the preacher, but during 
his long absences picked laymen filled the pulpit, 
and they did so with considerable success. The 
prayer of the great leader was answered to the full. 
How many thousands have been converted on that 
spot God only knows. After a history of one hun- 
dred and thirty-three years the original building was 
torn down in 1889 to make way for the larger and 
up-to-date plant which occupies the same site, and 
which is one of the most distinguished centers of 
Nonconformist activity in England. Organized 
along institutional lines, it is ministering to a teem- 
ing population in that part of London. Under the 
leadership of the late C. Silvester Horne, “Old 


Whitefield,” as it is familiarly called, gained an in- 
112 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


ternational fame; and it is gratifying to know that 
never more than in recent years has it been what 
the founder prayed it might be—a “soul-trap.” 


EXPERIENCES AS AN ITINERANT 


Whitefield loved London, and unless out of the 
country, he usually spent a part, if not the whole, 
of each winter there. He had the Tabernacle, and 
later the Chapel, and in favorable weather he could 
preach in the fields. But through life he held to 
an early resolve not to “nestle” in London. He 
dreaded entering “winter quarters,” and he always 
longed for the spring, when once again he could 
begin ranging up and down the land. He was 
glad to preach anywhere, in private homes, rich or 
poor, in barns, in church or chapel, and especially 
under the open sky. 

He was a prodigious worker. We find him in 
midwinter, preaching nineteen times in four days, 
twelve of the services being in the open. In a 
space of thirty-six hours he preached five times, 
“expounded” four times, and attended a love-feast 
that held on till four in the morning. A letter writ- 
ten in the spring of 1743 gives us a glimpse of his 
activities: Following a very heavy Sunday, “it 
was past one in the morning before I could lay my 
weary body down.” But he was up at five, hurry- 
ing on horseback to the place where he preached 


at seven. “At ten I read prayers and preached in 
113 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Stenhouse Church,” and administered the Lord’s 
Supper. “Then I rode to Stroud, where I was 
enabled to preach to about twelve thousand... . 
About six in the evening I preached to about the 
like number on Hampton Common... . After 
this I went to Hampton and held a general love- 
feast. ... I went to bed about midnight, very 
cheerful and very happy.” At daylight the next 
morning he was at it again. 

Remember that Whitefield’s sermons often ex- 
tended to an hour and well beyond, and that he 
threw into every message all the passionate earnest- 
ness of his soul. No wonder that as the years passed 
he became so worn that his pace slackened. During 
the closing decade of his life there were considerable 
periods when he was able to preach very little, or 
none at all. 

In comparison with Wesley, Whitefield was not 
often imperiled by mob violence. He used to say 
of himself that he had “very little natural courage.” 
And yet he was far from being a coward, and more 
than once he stood his ground against assaults that 
would have terrified most men. As he journeyed 
from place to place, his experiences, if not always 
thrilling, at least were interesting. In those days 
the main roads were infested with bandits, and trav- 
elers were liable to be held up at any time. “In 
one of his journeys Whitefield was told of a widow 
with a large family, whose landlord had distrained 


her furniture, and was about to sell it, unless her 
114 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


rent was paid. Whitefield’s purse was never large, 
but his sympathy was great, and he immediately 
gave the five guineas which the helpless woman 
needed. ‘The friend who was traveling with him 
hinted that the sum was more than he could reason- 
ably afford, to which the gushing, if not perfectly 
accurate, reply was, “When God brings a case of 
distress before us, it is that we may relieve it.’ The 
two travelers proceeded on their journey, and be- 
fore long encountered a highwayman, who de- 
manded their money, which they gave. Whitefield 
now turned the tables on his friend, and reminded 
him how much better it was for the poor widow to 
have the five guineas than the thief who had just 
robbed them. They had not long resumed their 
travel before the man returned and demanded 
Whitefield’s coat, which was more respectable than 
hisown. This request was also granted, Whitefield 
accepting the robber’s ragged habiliments till he 
could procure a better. Presently they per- 
ceived the marauder again galloping toward them 
most furiously; and now, fearing that their lives 
were threatened, they also spurred their horses, 
and, fortunately, arrived at some cottages, before 
the highwayman could stop them. ‘The thief was 
balked, and, no doubt, was immensely mortified; 
for when Whitefield took off the man’s tattered 
coat, he found, in one of its pockets, a carefully 
wrapped parcel containing one hundred guineas.” 


Thus the astonished preacher suddenly became pos- 
115 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


sessor of the proceeds of sundry highway rob- 
beries!? 


In ScotTtanp, Wa.LEs, AND [IRELAND 


John Wesley, with his stanch Arminianism, 
never made the impression in Scotland that he did 
south of the Tweed. But Whitefield, who was a 
Calvinist, fared better. All told, he journeyed to 
the north fourteen times, his first visit being in the 
summer of 1741. Presbyterianism was the estab- 
lished faith in Scotland, but there, as in England, 
genuine religion was almost dead. Quite recently 
a group of earnest clergymen of evangelical spirit 
had withdrawn from the old Kirk and had formed 
“The Associate Presbytery.” In many ways they 
were akin to the Oxford Methodists, and when 
Whitefield heard of them, at once there was awak- 
ened in him a fellow feeling. He corresponded 
with them, and presently they invited him to make 
them a visit. He went with high hopes, but soon 
found himself in a disagreeable situation. The Se- 
ceders were extremely narrow. They demanded 
that their visitor preach exclusively for them and 
wholly ignore the old Kirk. But while in a gen- 
eral way Whitefield’s sympathies were with the new 
party, he refused to be drawn into their contro- 
versy, and insisted that he be left free to associate 
with any company of Christians, and to fill any 

1'This story originally appeared in The Gospel Magazine, 1816, and 


is told by Tyerman, I: 525. 
116 





THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


pulpit to which he was invited; and to this purpose 
he held firmly till his return to England in October. 

The following June he was back for a second 
visit, and he heard with joy that all Scotland was 
stirring with a new life. At once he threw himself 
into evangelistic work, chiefly with the members of 
the Established Kirk, for the ‘other party had 
grown very cool. A few weeks passed and then the 
storm broke. The Seceders could contain them- 
selves no longer, and they turned upon Whitefield 
with strange fierceness. He was publicly de- 
nounced as “an abjured, prelatic hireling,” “a limb 
of antichrist; a boar and a wild beast.’ When he 
preached in the fields or for the enemy, and souls 
were converted, it was anathematized as the work 
of the devil; and a day of fasting was appointed 
that they might implore divine forgiveness for hav- 
ing once invited such a son of Beelzebub to visit 
them. When Whitefield heard of it, he cried: “To 
what length may prejudice carry even good men? 
From giving way to the first risings of bigotry and 
party spirit, good Lord deliver us!” 

But the opposition did not seriously disturb him. 
The work went right on, and as the years passed 
the Seceders grew more lenient. At every subse- 
quent visit Whitefield’s grip on the Scottish people 
was strengthened. They came not only to honor 
but to love him, so that, in 1768, when he was there 
for what proved to be the last time, he exclaimed, 


“I am here only in danger of being hugged to 
117 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


death.” Multitudes were awakened, and among 
them many young men who entered the ministry. 
It is doubtful if anyone not native to the soil ever 
preached in Scotland whose influence was as deep 
and abiding as that of George Whitefield. He had 
much to do with reshaping the religious life of the 
country and in giving to it the strong evangelical 
tone which it retains to the present day. 

Whitefield was also very fond of Wales. He 
made frequent tours through the Principality, and 
wherever he went, with few exceptions, he was re- 
ceived with high honor. Though not the founder 
of the Calvinistic Methodists, he was for a number 
of years their moderator, and to the end of his life 
he was a trusted friend and counselor. Wales 
owes an untold debt of gratitude to the great 
evangelist. 

There was something about Ireland that ap- 
pealed to John Wesley. He went there no less than 
twenty times, establishing an important work, and 
his name is associated with every part of the island. 
But it was otherwise with Whitefield. He visited 
Ireland only twice, and although he received a 
warm welcome and had his usual success in preach- 
ing, both visits were comparatively brief. 

While he was there the second time, in 1757, he 
had an experience he could never forget. One 
Sunday afternoon he preached to a great crowd on 
a green near Dublin. Starting to leave at the 


close, he was suddenly set on by a mob that seemed 
118 





THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


determined to end his work for all time. During 
the service he had been attended by a soldier and 
several preachers, but at the first sign of real dan- 
ger they fled for their lives, leaving Whitefield to 
get on as best he could. “Vollies of hard stones,” 
he tells us, ‘““came from all quarters, and every step 
I took a fresh stone struck, and made me reel back- 
ward and forward, till I was almost breathless, and 
was covered all over with blood.” One large stone 
hit him in the temple and he fully expected to be 
killed but by a happy providence finally escaped. 
Years later, a stranger called on him one day in 
London, and when Whitefield learned he was an 
Irishman, he took off his cap, and bending toward 
him placed his hand on a deep scar in his head, 
saying, “Sir, this wound I got in your country for 
preaching Christ.” 


AMONG THE NOBILITY 


It is a singular fact that although John Wesley 
was born in the choicest of circles, and all through 
childhood and youth enjoyed a social environment 
far beyond anything that George Whitefield knew, 
he seems never to have felt thoroughly at home in 
what might be called high society. It is needless 
to say that whenever entertained in the palaces of 
the great, he carried himself with distinguished 
propriety; but his happiest hours were not spent 
there, nor did he very often preach to such classes. 


In his Journal, more than once we find a comment 
119 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


like this: “I was a little out of my element among 
lords and ladies. I love plain company best.” 

Whitefield, on the other hand, was nowhere at 
greater ease than among the nobility. In 1739, or 
earlier, he had the rare good fortune to become ac- 
quainted with the Countess of Huntingdon, one of 
the most remarkable women of her age, and his 
whole after-life was profoundly influenced by her 
friendship for him. . The Countess was of royal 
descent; she was held in high esteem by King 
George III, and moved freely in -court circles. 
Still more unusual and significant, she was deeply 
religious, from the first intensely interested in the 
Methodist movement, and all through the years 
courageously open in letting the world know where 
her sympathies lay. Whitefield had not been long 
in the ministry when she heard of him and became 
impressed with his divine call, and she urged Bishop 
Benson to ordain him to the priesthood. The 
bishop yielded; but some time after, annoyed over 
the young man’s irregularities, he expressed to the 
Countess bitter regret at having done so. With 
great spirit she replied, “My lord, mark my words 
—when you come upon your dying bed, that will 
be one of the few ordinations you will reflect upon 
with complacence!’’ It is interesting to know that 
when the bishop lay dying he sent ten guineas to 
Whitefield, as a token of his favor, and begged to 
be remembered by him in his prayers. 


Several years later the Countess made White- 
120 


THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


field her domestic chaplain, and through her he was 
introduced to many of the nobility. While recog- 
nizing the vast work to be done among the poor 
and outcast, he soon came to feel that he had an 
equally important mission to those who dwelt in 
mansions, and whose souls were famished for God. 
In palatial homes, in both Scotland and England, 
and especially in the drawing room of the Countess, 
he preached scores of times before the most bril- 
liant companies. Many pages might be filled with 
the names of the lords and ladies who hung spell- 
bound upon his words: the élite of the realm, lead- 
ers in court circles, those eminent in affairs of state 
and in art and literature. A social nonentity, not a 
drop of blue blood in his veins, yet no other 
preacher in England had such a hearing; and some 
of his most notable spiritual triumphs were won 
where we should least expect them. 
_ Needless to say that the same gospel which he 
preached in the field he declared in the palace. One 
day his aristocratic hearers were amazed at his af- 
firming that Jesus was so glad to receive sinners 
that he welcomed even “the devil’s castaways.” 
“Absurd! Impossible!’ they exclaimed to each 
other at the close of the service, after the speaker 
had retired from the room. Being told of their © 
comments, Whitefield hurried back and proved to 
them from his own observation that this very mar- 
vel was happening day after day. 


Throughout his ministry Whitefield carried on 
121 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


an extensive correspondence with both men and 
women of the titled class. His letters, simple and 
straightforward, show his burning eagerness to 
touch the hearts and lives of his aristocratic friends. 
It is midnight, after a day of toil, but he will not go 
to rest till he has written a message to “Lord 
L. °: “T hope Jesus is now passing by you, 
and saying unto you, ‘Live!’ O that the stone of 
infidelity, which before lay at the door of your heart 
may be now rolled away!... My Lord, if you could 
be brought once to love secret prayer, and to con- 
verse feelingly with God in his word, your heaven 
will begin on earth. .. . As for praying in your 
family, I intreat you, my Lord, not to neglect it. 
Apply to Christ for strength to overcome your 
present fears. ‘They are the effects of pride, or in- 
fidelity, or both. After once or twice the difficulty 
will be over... . My Lord, you are upon my 
heart. Methinks I would undergo the pangs of 
the new birth for you; but Jesus can carry you 
through.” 

Again we find him writing to “Lady F 
S——.”: “My heart’s desire and continued prayer 
is that your Ladyship, having put your hand to the 
plow, may be kept from looking back! Satan will 
not be wanting to exert his utmost efforts to divert 
you from the cross. He knows of what influence 
your Ladyship’s example must necessarily be, and 
therefore will always be striving to persuade your 


Ladyship at least to compound matters, and to at- 
122 











AUTOGRAPH LETTER BY WHITEFIELD 


[London, March 25, 1762. If the Redeemer spares me-I have thoughts of taking an 
American Voyage—Who knows but we may meet once more on this side Jordan? 
Lord Jesus help us in all things to say, not my will but thine be done—lI can as 
yet preach but twice or thrice a week—But the Redeemer is able to do more for 
me—I know you will pray that- He may—Oh my Dr. Friend, study I entreat you 
study to live near Him—Look up continually for the aids of His blessed Spirit & you 
shall be help’d to adorn the Gospel in all things That this may be your happy lot is 
the earnest prayer of my Dr. Mr. Read 
Yours, etc in our Common Redeemer 
GWhitefield 





1) 


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THE BRITISH ISLES FOR CHRIST 


tempt to reconcile two irreconcilable differences— 
Christ and the world. But your Ladyship is too 
well grounded to hearken to his delusive insinua- 
tions, and too noble to refuse to give your whole 
heart to him who has bought it with no less price 
than that of his own most precious blood. What a 
price is now put into your Ladyship’s hands! What 
a glorious opportunity is now afforded you, to show 
even before kings, that we are made kings indeed, 
and priests unto God! Methinks I see angels gazing 
to see how your Ladyship acts your part. O that 
the angel of the everlasting covenant may always 
accompany you, and by the power of his eternal and 
all-conquering spirit, enable your Ladyship to fight 
the good fight of faith, and run with patience the 
glorious race that is set before you!” 

We are safe in saying that by voice and pen, 
through a whole generation, George Whitefield did 
more than any other man to arouse a new religious 
faith in the higher circles of English society. 


123 





CHAPTER IX 


RANGING AND HUNTING IN 
AMERICA 


We lead a moving life, but I trust we move heavenward. 


Eternity! Eternity! The very writing or hearing of 
this word is enough to make one dead to the world and 
alive to God. 


CHAPTER IX 


RANGING AND HUNTING IN 
AMERICA 


W HITEFIELD’s first visit to America, in the sum- 
mer of 1738, was very brief. After a few weeks in 
Savannah he returned to England, partly to com- 
plete his ordination to the priesthood and partly 
to obtain money for the proposed orphanage. The 
following summer he sailed again for these West- 
ern shores, landing near Cape Henlopen, on the 
Delaware coast, and riding through the forest to 
Philadelphia. ‘This time he remained in America 
more than a year, becoming fairly introduced to the 
people on whom he was to make so deep and lasting 
an impression. When he left England it was sup- 
posed he would quietly settle in Savannah as min- 
ister of the parish church. Impossible for such a 
man! He went down to Georgia but was too rest- 
less to stay there. ‘True, he needed help for the 
orphanage from the wealthy colonies in the North; 
but, far more, he was a prophet, with a divine mes- 
sage as a burning fire shut up in his bones, a mes- 
sage not for an obscure corner but for the entire 
land. And soon we find him entering on that long 
series of journeys, North and South, which con- 


tinued at intervals till his death in 1770. 
| 127 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


AMERICA IN WHITEFIELD’S TIME 


The America that Whitefield knew was not only 
quite unlike the America of to-day, but in many 
ways it differed from the mother country. The 
population was sparse and there were only three 
cities of any size—Boston, New York, and Phila- 
delphia. For many years Boston led, but before 
the Revolution Philadelphia had leaped forward 
and proudly boasted of 32,000 inhabitants; New 
York followed with 23,000, and Boston dropped 
into third place with only 16,000. 

Transportation was tedious, and so far as possi- 
ble waterways were used. Roads may have been 
none too good in England, but they were boule- . 
vards compared with those in America. Outside 
of the cities wheeled vehicles were unknown till the 
middle of the eighteenth century; people traveled 
on horseback. The first stagecoach between New 
York and Philadelphia was put on in 1756. In fair 
weather the distance of ninety miles was covered 
in three days. No wonder that Whitefield shunned 
winter travel. It was conducive neither to good 
spirits nor good health, to arrive at an inn at 
ten o'clock at night, worn, famished, and half 
frozen; swallow a bit of cold supper, climb into a 
cold bed, and at three in the morning climb out 
again, dress by the feeble light of a farthing candle, 
and amid snow and ice start off on another eigh- 


teen-hour journey. In 1769, shortly before White- 
128 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


field made his last trip North, a faster coach, drawn 
by young and spirited horses, was put on this route. 
People along the way left their work and watched 
with astonishment the “Flying Machine,” as it 
was called, go whizzing by. ‘The rate of speed may 
be estimated by remembering that it still took two 
days to make the ninety miles! It was two years 
after Whitefield’s death before the first coach was 
started between Boston and New York. It ran 
only twice a month and a distance that is now trav- 
eled in five hours took thirteen days. 

Taverns were rather common. ‘They bore such 
appealing names as “The Penny Pot House,” “The 
Jolly Tar Inn,” “The Crooked Billet Inn,” “Mrs. 
Mullin’s Beefsteak House,” or ““The Blue Anchor 
Tavern,” and some of them were famous for their 
cooking. In order to keep the meat slowly revolv- 
ing before the fire, it was the custom in many kitch- 
ens to train small dogs to run in hollow cylin- 
ders, like squirrels, the cylinders being attached 
to the turning-jacks. The old annals tell of more 
than one impatient traveler who was delayed in 
dining, while the servants were scurrying around 
after truant canines. | 

Although Whitefield frequently stopped at tav- 
erns, more often he was invited to private homes. 
It was the rule, especially in the more sparsely set- 
tled districts, to entertain freely anyone who came 
along. Many of the well-to-do settlers were in the 


habit, every night, of setting out a table loaded with 
129 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


food, so that the chance wayfarer could help 
himself. All this greatly impressed White- 
field. Again and again he exclaimed, “The 
Americans are the most hospitable people under 
heaven.” 

Most of the homes, both in town and country, 
were surprisingly comfortable. This was especially 
true in Philadelphia. The dwellings were well 
built, usually of brick, with projecting roofs and 
wide porches, and many were surrounded with 
spacious gardens. Often a sundial was set in the 
wall. Carpets were not common, for most people 
preferred bare floors, scrubbed every day and 
sprinkled with white sand. 'Those old-time, ram- 
bling houses, with their tiny window-panes and the 
huge open fireplaces, bedsteads so high that a cradle 
could be slipped under them, spinning-wheel and 
loom-shuttle, tallow-candle and warming-pan, with 
all the rest that belonged to that day, had nothing 
sumptuous, but they could boast of solid comfort. 
In such homes Whitefield was entertained many a 
time. 

As the years went by, the private coach and se- 
dan-chair became common with the wealthier fam- 
ilies, and fashion grew more exacting in her de- 
mands. Society leaders among the women were re- 
splendent in silks and satins, velvets and brocades. 
It was also the custom to pile up the hair to 
prodigious heights and in extraordinary shapes. 


Of course professional hairdressers were required, 
130 


En 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


and on the eve of some notable function these artists 
began early, so that frequently a colonial dame 
was ready to start for a ball twenty-four hours 
ahead of time, and she must needs sit up all night, 
scarcely stirring lest she play havoc with the upper 
works. We can readily imagine what Whitefield 
thought of all this. Many a time, in public and in 
private, with no uncertain sound, he delivered his 
soul concerning female frivolities. 

Whitefield soon discovered that on the whole, 
morals in America were higher than in England. 
There were fewer serious crimes, such as highway 
robbery and murder, while official corruption was 
far léss common. It was likewise true that law- 
breakers were treated with greater humanity. At 
the very period when the statute books of England 
specified more than two hundred crimes punishable 
with death, Massachusetts named twenty and 
Pennsylvania only two. 

Of course drinking was well- ah universal. The 
records tell of occasional banquets where more than 
a hundred different dishes were served, and quan- 
tities of liquor almost past belief were consumed. 
It was worse in Philadelphia than in Boston, so that 
when John Adams came South on a visit he stood 
aghast at what he saw, though he presently fell in 
with Philadelphia’s ways. A funeral was a great 
time for feasting. If the deceased was a person of 
note, thousands attended, and the eating and drink- 


ing were on an immense scale. But while Boston 
131 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


may have been more sober than Philadelphia, it was 
by no means “dry.” Less than ten years after the 
Great Awakening swept over Massachusetts, rum- 
making in the colony was at its height, with sixty- 
three distilleries at work. It was estimated that 
more than nine hundred vessels, sailing from Bos- 
ton and neighboring ports, regularly carried rum 
as a part of their cargo, either for use on board or 
for sale in other lands. Yet the Puritan conscience 
was apparently undisturbed. Nor did Whitefield 
ever lift his voice against the liquor traffic. On his 
first visit to Georgia he deplored the fact that the 
home government would not permit the colonists 
to import either rum or slaves, and when, a little 
later, the ban on rum was removed, he was highly 
gratified. Needless to say, though not a total ab- 
stainer, he was strictly temperate, and he always 
abhorred drunkenness; yet it seems never to have 
occurred to him to strike at the root of the evil. 
But such were the times in which he lived, and 
it must be frankly admitted that on some ques- 
tions the evangelist was not in advance of the 
times. : | 
Conscience is often curiously erratic. The Puri- 
tans looked askance at the theater, but they were 
extremely fond of cock-fighting, and they saw no 
harm in the lottery. Massachusetts went in whole- 
heartedly for distilleries, and then passed a law 
sternly forbidding kissing on the streets between 


the sexes as a gross indecency. As late as 1759 a 
132 





RANGING AND HUNTING 


Boston sea-captain, returning from a long cruise, 
and meeting his wife on the wharf, saluted her as 
one would naturally expect. At once he was ar- 
rested and sentenced by the outraged magistrate 
to be publicly whipped. 

Nothing in America impressed Whitefield more 
happily than the way in which the Sabbath was ob- 
served, especially in New England. He often re- 
ferred to it in letters to English friends. Even in 
a city as large as Boston the stillness was almost 
deathlike. Everyone who could do so went to 
church. There was no strolling, and if a group 
happened to linger on the street for conversation, 
they were quickly dispersed by a vigilant constable. 
Some of the clergy were so strict that they refused 
to baptize babies born on Sunday. But one of 
these ministers was put to unexpected and painful 
confusion, when on a Sunday morning his own wife 
presented him with twins. The old annals intimate 
that from that time the nonbaptism rule fell into 
serious disfavor. 

At church the men and women, as a rule, sat 
apart. If there was a gallery, it was reserved for 
the children, who were kept in order by elderly and 
solemn-faced women, armed with light rods. The 
churches were unheated save for the small individ- 
ual warming-pans, and the discomfort during a 
New England winter must have been extreme. Yet 
the people flocked to worship and rarely do we read 


of a complaint. 
133 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


TRAVELING IN THE SOUTH 


As we have already seen, Whitefield sailed for 
America on his second voyage in the summer of 
1739. He arrived in Philadelphia November 2. A 
few days later he began the overland journey to 
his distant parish in the south. The farther he went 
the rougher and wilder became the country. Often 
the way lay through-almost trackless forests, with 
treacherous swamps, and streams swollen with the 
winter rains. Settlements were few and far apart 
and he rarely knew where the night would be spent. 
Occasionally, coming to a clearing, and passing 
through a pack of yelping hounds, he would find a 
rude but welcome hospitality under some planter’s 
roof. Now and then a wayside cabin, boasting that 
it was a tavern, offered primitive entertainment. 
Often he was thankful for a bed of leaves under a 
friendly tree. A fire was soon kindled, and as the 
weary preacher lay down and listened to the howl- 
ing of the wolves, he gratefully reflected that as the 
fire of brushwood kept off the wild beasts, so “the 
fire of God’s love keeps the devil off.” 

These experiences were decidedly new to the 
young Englishman, but he enjoyed them, and 
through the years, as opportunity came, he contin- 
ued his forest journeys. As he once wrote to John 
Wesley: “If you ask what I am doing? I answer, 
‘Ranging and hunting in the American woods after 


poor sinners.’”’ And there was need of it. Much 
134 

















Solid tom a moral Yonsues 


FUVENTUS, 


SIPOCSSLSIPHS TANS Seno sesas 


PHILADELPHIA 
On Friday laft the Rev. Mr. WAITEFIELD, arsived 
here, with his Friends from New-York, where he preach’d 







eight Limes; and on his Rerurn hither preach’d at Evizabeth- 
bicfl | Teen, Brunfwick, Maidenhead, Trenton, Nehaminy and dbivg~ 
, and | dow. He has preach’d twice every Day in the Church to 
ve great Crowds, except Tuefdiy, when he preach’d at Germon- 
‘rOw- | Town, fram a Balcony to abour 5000 People in the Streer > 
| hire | And laft Night the Crowd was fo great to hear his’ farewel * 
thim | Sermon, that the Church could not conrain onchalf,where~ = 
has | upon they withdrew to Society-Hill, where he preach d from 
been | a Balcony to a Multitude, compured at not lefs than 
rega | 10,000 People. He left this Ciry to day, and is to preach — 
Pat | at Chefler ; to morrow at Willines Torn, Satuiday ar New. » 
venef- Cafile, Sunday at Wbiteclay-Creck, and {> proceed on his Way = 
many | to Georgia, thro’ Maryland, Virginia and Carolina. . 
Vind _. GCuftom Houfe, Philadelphia, Emredin. 
nings | Sloop St. Auguttine, John Denmark, from New-York. 
ty =| ~~ Sloop Swan, Burgefs Hall, from Boon. = tit istCS ¢ 
Man Entred Ont. ._. 
Au- | Brigt. Squirrel, William Hill, for Jamaica. : 
Peng Cleared. 


es seats SSNPS Ca 








: . 5 ONE hak ME MAREREST CO EES 
| Dayo had a Letter from him, which was fent 
, with all pofible hafte, which I fuppote is for 9 difpatch 
| for thar Place :.’The Rebellious Negroes a ftopt fram 
| doing any further Mifchief, many of them g been put 
jto the moftcrue! Death. The yellow Fever is abated, bur 
| has been very Mortal. : 
_ FHILADELPHI 2 
| On Tharfday laf the Rev. Mr WAITEFIELD, left 
this Ciry, and was accompany d to Ghefler by abour 150 
| Hoste, and preach’d there ro about 7000 People ; on fridiy 
‘| he preach 'd twice at Wiilixgs-Town to about 5000; on Su- 
furday at Newu-Cafile to about 2500, and the fame Eveuing 
at Chriflian- Bride to about 3000; on Sunday.at W biteclay- 
Creek he preach'd twice, refting about half an Hour between 
;| the Sermons, to about Soco, of whom about 3000 "tis com- 
| puted came on Horfe-back, it rain’d moft of the Time and : 
}- | yet they Rood in the open Air: On Afonday he was to preach 

_j at North Loft, and then proceed direGly for Anmapolis, 
- Cufiem Eeufe, Philadg!poia, Entred in. 

te, ( Vulcan, Matthias Kirg, from Rhode-Ifland. _ / 

& 4 Samuel and Mary, Jaha Dunn, from 5. Carolina, 
2 Indufiry, John "Meas, from Garbadoes. 





frend 
bs 
o 
ye, 
et, 






















ih ag ft 

© € Content, Berhuel Gardner, from Golon. 
* % a fod i, £ oe Sa. ee 

Brier, Martha. Gurnev_ Wall, from Barbadees. 


Ee 
« La 


NEWS-ITEMS CONCERNING WHITEFIELD, BY BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 





RANGING AND HUNTING 


of the Southland was a spiritual desert. In many 
sections a clergyman had never been seen, and the 
people were practically heathen. The coming of 
Whitefield was like the visit of an angel. He 
touched lives everywhere, one or two, a family, per- 
haps a group of twenty; if a hundred gathered, he 
called it “extraordinary,” considering the scant 
population. It showed the genius of the man that 
he could so readily adapt himself to any occasion. 
Without doubt he was in his glory when speaking 
to thousands; but he was also happy and effective 
with a score. 

It was on these journeys in the South that he 
came into close contact with slavery. He was 
warmly interested in the Negroes. At one time he 
planned a large school for them, and he never 
ceased to labor for their conversion. He sternly 
rebuked those planters who would not permit their 
slaves to attend a preaching service on the plea that 
religion would make them proud and disobedient. 
More than once he imperiled his standing in the 
South by his vigorous denunciation of the many 
masters who treated their slaves cruelly. And yet 
the unpleasant fact must be recorded that to the 
end of his life he was a defender of slavery. In 
this he was out of accord with numerous leaders 
on both sides of the Atlantic. When he and John 
Wesley first came to Georgia the trustees of the 
colony forbade the importation of slaves. Wesley 


encouraged this stand, as did many others, but 
135 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Whitefield condemned it. He believed that in such 
a hot climate work in the fields could be done only 
by Negroes, and that meant slaves. So he begged 
for them, and when the trustees yielded, he publicly 
rejoiced. At the very time that Wesley, reflecting 
the best conscience of England and America, was 
denouncing slavery as “that execrable sum of all 
villainies,’ Whitefield was himself becoming a 
slave-owner, in purchasing slaves for the orphan- 
age-farm. And in his will he disposed of his slaves 
as mere chattels, along with cattle and carts. We 


do not question the great preacher’s perfect sin-. 


cerity, but even his most ardent admirers must con- 
fess that at this point his ethical insight was de- 
ficient. 


RELIGIOUS CONDITIONS IN AMERICA 


Whitefield’s first overland journey to Savannah 
ended on January 10, 1740. During his brief stay 
there he resigned his parish, and henceforth he was 
free to devote more time to the orphans, and to be- 
come, as he called it, “a gospel rover.” A few 
weeks later he was back in Pennsylvania. <A great 
work awaited him, especially in the more thickly 
peopled territory from Philadelphia to Boston. A 
nation was in the making; everything was at the 
formative stage; influences in those years meant 
far more than they could a generation or two later. 

We cannot doubt that Whitefield had come to 


America for such a time as this. To be sure, re- 
136 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


ligion was not as dead here as in England. In 
most parts there was no overshadowing state 
church; Dissenters were in the majority; there was 
more freedom, spontaneity, life. But conditions 
were far from satisfying. Many of the Episcopal 
clergy, especially in Maryland and Virginia, were 
sadly lacking, not only in scholarship but in morals. 
In Pennsylvania and to the north, the Presby- 
terians were strong in numbers but weak in re- 
ligion. Church membership among them was 
scarcely more than a form. Anyone could join 
whose conduct was decent and who accepted the 
creed. With rare exceptions revivals were un- 
heard of. | 

It was not much better in New England. The 
early Puritans emphasized the New Birth. To 
them religion was intensely real. In many churches 
revival flames never went out, summer or winter. 
Conversions in the regular services were so fre- 
quent that it was a common inquiry by those un- 
able to attend, “Were any awakened?’ But those 
days passed, and there followed a spiritual chill 
that was deadening. Then, in 1734, at Northamp- 
ton, Massachusetts, during the ministry of Jona- 
than Edwards, there began the Great Awakening. 
It swept from place to place with consuming power 
and carried all before it. But two years later its 
initial force was well-nigh spent, and then—what 
of the future? 


Was there not a heavenly coincidence in the fact 
137 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


that at the very time when the Holy Club at Ox- 
ford was sending out the leaders of the Evangelical 
Revival which spread over Britain and beyond, the 
Great Awakening in America was getting under 
way? And George Whitefield, born again in the 
Holy Club, was the chosen apostle of the Lord in 
linking together these two awakenings that finally 
merged in the vast movement which changed the 
religious face of the Einglish-speaking world. He 
came to America just in time to infuse new energy 
into the languishing work begun under Edwards, 
and to thrust it forward like a flaming torch into 
all the colonies. The keynote of his preaching on 
this side of the sea was the same as in England, 
“Ye must be born again!” Granted that he was 
too narrow in his interpretation of the New Birth, 
that ofttimes he was censorious and intolerant, yet 
there can be no doubt that he laid his hand on the 
deadly weakness of the church when he pointed out 
how many there were, of the most approved stand- 
ing, both laymen and ministers, who had no saving 
knowledge of Jesus Christ. 

This unhappy state of affairs was due in part to 
the strange teaching of Solomon Stoddard, one of 
the most distinguished ministers that New Eng- 
Jand ever produced. For nearly sixty years, prior 
to his grandson, Jonathan Edwards, he had been 
pastor of the famous church at Northampton. In 
the latter part of his pastorate, the “venerable 


Stoddard,” as he was called, published his belief 
138 


ia 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


that while conversion was desirable it was not es- 
sential, that people might be welcomed to the com- 
munion and received into the church without it; 
that young collegians who had also studied theology 
might be ordained to the ministry provided only 
they accepted the creed and their lives were not 
scandalous. ‘Though in many quarters these ideas 
met with vigorous opposition, as time passed they 
came to prevail rather widely, not only in New 
England, but far beyond. 

We can readily imagine what the flaming young 
prophet of the New Birth would say to all this. He 
had been in Pennsylvania scarcely a week before he 
discovered that many of the preachers in those 
parts held very lax notions. The Tennents were 
notable exceptions. This remarkable family came 
from Ireland in 1718, and the four sons as well as 
the father were all ministers. ‘The elder Tennent 
founded a school at Neshaminy, not far from Phila- 
delphia, where some of the most distinguished min- 
isters of that period received their education. ‘This 
“Log College,” as it was long called, became the 
parent of every Presbyterian college and theolog- 
ical seminary in America. 

Gilbert Tennent, one of the sons, was White- 
field’s fast friend and fellow-worker. He ardently 
sympathized with his English brother respecting 
the New Birth and the need of a converted min- 
istry. He was a veritable Boanerges, thundering 


his philippics against the low standards of those 
139 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


days. His Presbyterian brethren were so deeply 
offended that they excluded him from their Synod, 
but it did not disturb him in the least. In 1743 he 
organized a company of Whitefield’s converts in 
Philadelphia into a church, and served as its pastor 
till his death in 1765. This old organization, asso- 
ciated with some of Whitefield’s earliest victories, 
continues in downtown Philadelphia, in a most 
flourishing condition, ranking as one of the leading 
Presbyterian churches in America. 


WHITEFIELD IN NEw ENGLAND 


It was not till September, 1740, that Whitefield 
arrived in Boston for the first time. He had been 
impatient to visit Puritan New England, and New 
England had been impatient to see and hear the 
young man of whose extraordinary preaching so 
many reports had come, both from beyond the sea 
and from the colonies to the south. The Bos- 
tonians fairly shook off their staid ways in welcom- 
ing the newcomer. Several miles from the city he 
was met by a cavalcade of distinguished citizens, 
with the governor’s son at the head, and escorted 
into town. Most of the ministers were very cor- 
dial, though one eminent doctor of divinity, meet- 
ing him on the street, said, with a scowl, “I am sorry 
to see you here!” 

“So is the devil,” was the smiling reply. 

But, as a rule, he was received with high honor. 


At once he began to preach. What crowds! 
140 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


Boston had never seen the like. And better than 
the crowds of mere listeners were the numbers who 
were awakened. Day after day, from early morn- 
ing, the house where the preacher was entertained 
was besieged with weeping men and women, beg- 
ging for a word of prayer and counsel, that they 
might find God. And others, who did not come, 
wrote, asking to be prayed for. 

More than once he spoke before the faculty and 
students of Harvard College, where he was treated 
with great respect. The young men were mightily 
stirred. Word came to Whitefield: “The College 
is entirely changed; the students are full of God; 

. . the voice of prayer and praise fills their cham- 
bers.” So glorious was the work of grace that the 
overseers set apart an entire morning for a service 
of thanksgiving to God. One of Whitefield’s open- 
air preaching places was under the noble Cam- 
bridge elm, where, thirty-five years later, Wash- 
ington took command of the Continental army; so 
that this spot is doubly hallowed. 

No one in all New England was more deeply 
sympathetic with Whitefield’s mission than Gover- 
nor Belcher, of Massachusetts. He was constantly 
showing his intense interest. One morning “he took 
me by myself,” wrote Whitefield, “and exhorted me 
to go on in stirring up the ministers. . . . As we 
were going to meeting, he said, ‘Mr. Whitefield, do 
not spare rulers any more than ministers, no, not 


the chief of them.’ I preached in the open air to 
141 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


some thousands. The word fell with weight. After 
the sermon the governor remarked, ‘I pray God, I 
may apply what has been said to my own heart. 
Pray, Mr. Whitefield, that I may hunger and 
thirst after righteousness.’ Dinner being ended, 
with tears in his eyes, he kissed me, and took leave 
of me.” 

On his first visit to New England Whitefield re- 
mained less than a month, but he started a train of 
events that left an impress for all time. A revival 
began in Boston that fall which continued for a 
year and a half. Sunday after Sunday the 
churches were crowded. No less than thirty reli- 
gious societies were organized. The old annals re- 
late that “the very face of the town seemed to be 
strangely altered. Even the Negroes and boys in 
the streets left their usual rudeness, and taverns 
were found empty of all but lodgers.” During the 
winter of 1741 thousands of converts were enrolled. 

Before leaving New England Whitefield visited — 
Northampton and preached four times for Jona- — 
than Edwards. A revival broke out, which, under 
the fostering care of Edwards, went on for two 
years. Nearly every place in New England that 
Whitefield touched during those few weeks was 
affected in a similar way. But, after all, these re- 
sults were only incidental; there was something 
still deeper. The prophet of the New Birth, with 
fearless and flaming zeal, preached this mighty 


truth among the children of the Puritans, as he had 
142 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


everywhere else. Nothing could serve in its place. 
Baptism, orthodox belief, moral conduct, church 
membership? All important, but—“Ye must be 
born again!” Woe unto unconverted ministers! 
Woe unto unconverted laymen! And woe unto the 
churches that tolerated them! This was the bur- 
den of the Lord as committed to George White- 
field. 

But though the message was inspired, unhappily 
the way in which it was sometimes presented was 
not inspired. If the youth of 1740 had been the 
mature and more restrained man of 1760, or later, 
many blunders would have been avoided. By na- 
ture Whitefield was strongly emotional and im- 
pulsive. He came to America and up into New 
England with a consuming conviction. His fame 
had preceded him, and he was welcomed with un- 
measured adulation. When he began to preach 
many wept and shouted for joy. ‘They said he was 
“an angel of God”; they compared him to Saint 
' Paul, and declared that it was “Puritanism come 
to life.’ He was a mere “stripling,” as he often 
called himself; and though his daily prayer was that 
he might be kept humble, he would have been more 
than human had he not been somewhat turned by 
the praises of men. We must admit that he often 
acted as if, by divine appointment, he was supreme 
religious censor. 

Unfortunately, no sooner did he arrive in Boston 


than several extremists caught his ear and gave 
143 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


him unsound advice, and, instead of waiting to form 
his own sober judgment, he leaped to conclusions. 
He decided that conditions in the land of the Puri- 
tans were worse than they really were, and he 
hurled his anathemas in a rather wholesale and in- 
discriminate fashion, especially against “uncon- 
verted” ministers. Jonathan EKidwards, who was 
eleven years his senior, whispered a word of caution, 
but it only served to irritate him. His best friends 
were disturbed, though they tried to excuse him 
on the ground that he was swept away by youthful 
zeal, 'To make matters still worse, his private 
Journal, containing severe strictures on persons 
and churches in New England, he allowed to be 
printed, and it soon passed into circulation. 

As if to add fuel to a fire already menacing, after 
Whitefield left New England, fanatics sprang up 
on every hand, imitators of the great preacher, with 
his faults but without his virtues and talents. They 
itinerated from place to place and did untold mis- 
chief. Is it any wonder that before many months 
passed, Boston and all the country round was seeth- 
ing with angry protests? 

In the meantime Whitefield had returned to his 
native shores, and it was not till the fall of 1744, 
after an interval of four years, that he again visited 
New England. This time no cavalcade came forth 
to meet him. Governor Belcher had moved to New 
Jersey, and hence there was no official weleome. At 


once Whitefield felt a strange chill. Ministers who 
144 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


had been cordial now held aloof, and pulpits were 
not clamoring for him as before. Associations of 
preachers passed resolutions opposing him, while 
both Harvard and Yale, where he had been received 
with every mark of honor, published formal ‘“Dec- 
larations” against him. Innumerable pamphlets 
concerning him and his work came from the press, 
and all but three were unfavorable. 

Whitefield was a sensitive soul and he felt all 
this keenly, but he never lost his balance. He hum- 
bly confessed that more than once youthful zeal had 
carried him too far, and he had said things that 
ought never to have been uttered. He also in- 
sisted—and he was right—that some of his state- 
ments had been misunderstood or had been grossly 
exaggerated. But while he admitted his faults, he 
receded not a hair’s breadth from his stand on the 
New Birth. His foes might dub him “Reverend 
Stripling,” and sneer at him as a man of “a weak 
mind, little learning, and no argument’; they might 
complain that he “plagued” them with his straight- 
forward preaching, and had created “scenes of con- 
fusion and disturbance’; they might criticize him 
for allowing converts to go about the streets singing 
psalms and hymns; even a member of the Harvard 
faculty, of a mathematical bent, might figure that 
every day Whitefield preached in Boston the upset 
to business, due to the eagerness of the people to 
hear him, meant a loss to the community of no less 


than a thousand pounds; but none of these things 
145 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


disturbed him. He had a prophet’s vision and a 
prophet’s message. “An opposer told me,” said he, 
“that I had unhinged many good sort of people. 
I believe it.’ And he went right on unhinging 
people who were clinging to a barren faith. Only 
he had learned a lesson; he became more guarded in 
his judgments, less censorious in his language. 

In spite of the blunders and ill feeling of some 
of those early New England days, a wonderful 
work was wrought. During the Great Awakening, 
which began under Edwards and was helped for- 
ward by Whitefield, forty thousand souls were 
added to the churches—extraordinary when we 
think of the sparse population. In and around Bos- 
ton alone no less than twenty ministers acknowl- 
edged that they never knew what conversion meant 
till Whitefield came among them. And, still better, 
for once and all a quietus was put on the idea of an 
“unconverted ministry.” Now and then New Eng- 
land might criticize Whitefield, but through all the 
years it tugged at his heart-strings. He loved it, 
so rich in Puritan memories, and he expressed his 
constant longing when he wrote to a friend, “Af- 
fection, intense affection, cries aloud, “Away to 
New England, to dear New England directly! ” 
And in turn, New England’s admiration and love 
for the great-hearted evangelist grew apace. As 
the years went by, old-time differences were for- 
gotten and every visit was more triumphant than 


the last. It mattered not where or when he 
146 


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SECTION OF WHITEFIELD’S JOURNAL 





Wednesday Novbr. 28th [1744] | Opened my publick administrations at Boston this 
afternoon at Dr. Colemans meeting house from Rom: Ist 16th I am not ashamed of 
the Gospel of Xt [Christ] , for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that 
beleveth—The congregation was very large, several ministers were present & the 
word was attended with a sweet power—Several things in the Chapter which I hinted 
at in the preface of my discourse seemed to be applicable to my circumstances & much 
affected my heart—For I could thank my God through Jesus Xt verse 8th that the 
faith & revival of religion in New England was spoken of throughout the world—And 
I could say verse 9th God is my witness, whom I - - — 


'} 


44 


— 


* 





—. 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


preached, night or day, no building could hold the 
crowds. He left an impress that will never be lost. 
It was fitting that his closing days should be spent 
there, and that this land of the Pilgrim Fathers 
should become the guardian of his tomb. 

On his first visit to New England Whitefield 
went by sea. He returned overland, stopping at 
New Haven and preaching to the Yale students. 
As we have already seen, later there came a break 
with Yale and Harvard, but it was temporary. He 
was intensely interested in both institutions. When 
the Harvard library was burned he was in this 
country. At once he made an urgent appeal to his 
friends in London to send books for a new col- 
lection, and the response was so large that he re- 
ceived the hearty thanks of the College. Yale grew 
very fond of him. On one occasion, after preaching, 
“The president came to me,” he tells us, “as I was 
going off in the chaise, and informed me that the 
students were so deeply impressed by the sermon 
that they were gone into the chapel, and earnestly 
entreated me to give them one more quarter of an 
hour’s exhortation.” For many years both schools 
were afflicted with a type of aristocracy, foolish as 
it was offensive. The students were seated in 
chapel and at recitations, in strict accordance with 
the social status of their parents, and the same 
cheap discrimination was carried into all college 
affairs. One can easily imagine how the Oxford 


graduate, who could never forget the days when 
147 | 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


he earned a living by mopping floors, would despise 
such foolery; and there can be no doubt that his 
sturdy preaching of Christian democracy did much 
to shatter the old custom. Yale gave it up in 1767, 
and in 1770, the very year of Whitefield’s death, 
Harvard followed suit. 


In NEw YoRK AND PHILADELPHIA 


On his American tours Whitefield spent less time 
in New York than in either Boston or Philadelphia. 
The opportunities to present his message were lim- 
ited. ‘The city was smaller; for some reason the 
Episcopal Church would never admit him to its 
pulpit; and the numerous adherents of the Dutch 
Reformed faith were naturally shy toward a min- 
ister of alien blood. Down in Wall Street there 
was a Presbyterian church, for many years the only 
one in the city of that denomination. Later a sec- 
ond one, familiarly called the “Brick Meeting,” 
was erected in Beekman Street, “in the field,” as 
people said in those days. Whitefield was always 
welcome at these two churches, and so great was the 
work done that the old Wall Street building had to 
be enlarged several timies to make room for the 
growing membership. 

He was especially fond of talking to sailors. He 
had been at sea so much that he knew just how to 
approach them. One day, when speaking to a 
crowd of tars down by the East River, he drew this 


picture: “Well, my boys, we have a cloudless sky, 
148 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


and are making fine headway over a smooth sea, 
before a light breeze, and we shall soon lose sight of 
land. But what means this sudden lowering of the 
heavens, and that dark cloud arising from beneath 
the western horizon? Hark! don’t you hear the dis- 
tant thunder? Don’t you see the flashes of light- 
ning? There is a storm gathering. Every man to 
his duty! How the waves rush and dash against 
the ship! The air is dark! The tempest rages! 
Our masts are gone! What next?’ For an instant 
he paused, while his excited listeners cried, “Take 
to the long-boat, sir!’ It gave the preacher the 
very chance he coveted to press home the lesson. 
The way south from New York to Philadelphia 
is dotted with places associated with Whitefield’s 
ministry. Of them all, none appeals to us as 
strongly as Princeton, or Prince Town, as it used 
to be called. Jonathan Belcher, who was such a 
warm friend of Whitefield’s in Massachusetts, 
afterward became governor of New Jersey, and in 
1748 he obtained a royal charter for a Presbyterian 
school, that came to be known as New Jersey Col- 
lege. It was genuinely Christian, and from the 
first Whitefield was peculiarly drawn to it. In 
England he met deputations sent over to raise 
money, introduced them to the Countess of Hunt- 
ingdon and other persons of eminence, signed a 
public appeal, preached sermons, and in various 
ways helped to secure considerable sums. When in 


America he visited the College as often as possible, 
149 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


and was the favorite preacher. Here was a school 
after his own heart. Nassau Hall will always be 
a more sacred place because its walls echoed to the 
voice and the footfall of George Whitefield. 

' The great preacher was especially fond of the 
city of William Penn, and the city was no less fond 
of him. It was the first place of any size that he 
visited in America, and some of his outstanding 
work was done there. Granted, his ways and words 
were not always approved. Many of the Quakers 
shook their heads, though, as one of them with ex- 
quisite serenity, remarked: “His intentions are 
good, but he has not yet arrived at such perfection 
as to see so far as he yet may.” At first the Epis- 
copalians received him, and then they turned 
against him; but it was in part his own fault. As 
we have already seen, in his early ministry, espe- 
cially, he was not always discreet, and he excited 
antagonism where there should have been none. 

But in spite of his plain preaching the city as a 
whole stood with him, and increasingly as the years 
passed. While some complained that he “threw a 
horrid gloom” over the place, there were enthusias- 
tic admirers and many of them. What preaching! 
The crowds never had enough. On one occasion, 
when he rose to speak at Chester, he faced nearly a 
thousand people who had followed him all the way 
from Philadelphia, twelve miles, most of them on 
foot. Another time, many went as far as New 


Brunswick, sixty miles to the north. At a period 
150 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


when the average Philadelphia minister looked 
upon a stipend of a hundred pounds a year as am- 
ple, Whitefield was offered eight hundred pounds 
if he would spend six months annually in the city, 
leaving him free to travel at will the rest of the year. 
Needless to say, he refused to be fettered. As time 
passed, opposition ceased, all doors were thrown 
open; not only were the people at large blessed, but, 
what was far more significant, scores of ministers 
of various denominations entered into a new reli- 
gious experience. 


FrienpsuHie With FRANKLIN 


By far the most interesting friendship that 
Whitefield formed in Philadelphia, if not in all 
America, was with Benjamin Franklin. When 
Whitefield arrived in the city, in the fall of 1739, 
Franklin was a young man of thirty-three. He was 
already publishing a weekly paper, the Pennsyl- 
vania Gazette, and was the leading printer in the 
city. On the alert for new business, he at once got 
in touch with the famous stranger and arranged to 
print his sermons and Journals. ‘This was the be- 
ginning of a warm friendship that continued un- 
broken till Whitefield’s death. Franklin’s com- 
ments on the great preacher are as racy as they are 
informing. Writing of what happened in 1740, he 
says: “The multitudes, of all sects and denomina- 
tions, that attended his sermons, were enormous, 


and it was a matter of speculation to me to observe 
151 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


the extraordinary influence of his oratory on his 
hearers, and how much they admired and respected 
him, notwithstanding his common abuse of them, by 
assuring them that they were naturally half beasts 
and half devils. It was wonderful to see the change 
soon made in the manners of our inhabitants. From 
_ being thoughtless and indifferent about religion, 
it seemed as if all the world were growing religious, 
so that one could not walk through Philadelphia in 
the morning without hearing psalms sung in dif- 
ferent families on every street.” 

He tells us that Whitefield “had a loud and clear 
voice, and articulated his words so perfectly that 
he might be heard and understood at a great dis- 
tance, especially as his auditories observed the most 
perfect silence. He preached one evening from the 
top of the Court House steps, which are in the mid- 
dle of Market Street, and on the west side of Sec- 
ond Street, which crosses it at right angles. Both 
streets were filled with his hearers to a considerable 
distance. Being among the hindermost in Market 
Street, I had the curiosity to learn how far he could 
be heard, by retiring backward down the street 
toward the river, and I found his voice distinct till 
I came near Front Street, when some noise in the 
street obscured it. Imagining, then, a semicircle, 
of which my distance should be the radius, and that 
it was filled with auditors, to each of whom I al- 
lowed two square feet, I computed that he might 


well be heard by more than thirty thousand.” 
152 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


Franklin was greatly impressed with the way 
Whitefield secured large collections for the orphan 
house in Savannah. “His eloquence had wonder- 
ful power over the hearts and purses of his hearers, 
of which I myself was an instance. I did not dis- 
approve of the design; but, as Georgia was then 
destitute of materials and workmen, and it was pro- 
posed to send them from Philadelphia at great ex- 
pense, I thought it would have been better to have 
built the house at Philadelphia, and to have brought 
the children to it. This I advised; but he was reso- 
lute in his first project, and rejected my counsel; 
and, I therefore, refused to contribute. I hap- 
pened some time after to attend one of his sermons, 
in the course of which I perceived he intended to 
finish with a collection; and I silently resolved he 
should get nothing from me. I had in my pocket 
a handful of copper money, three or four silver dol- 
lars, and five pistoles in gold. As he proceeded 
I began to soften, and concluded to give the copper. 
Another stroke of his oratory determined me to 
give the silver; and he finished so admirably that 
I emptied my pocket wholly into the collection 
dish, gold and all. At this sermon there was also 
one of our Club, who, being of my sentiments re- 
specting the building in Georgia, and suspecting a 
collection might be intended, emptied his pocket 
before he came from home. ‘Toward the conclusion 
of the discourse, however, he felt a strong inclina- 
tion to give, and applied to a neighbor who stood 

153 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


near him, to lend him money for the purpose. ‘The 
request was fortunately made to, perhaps, the only 
man in the company who had the firmness not to be 
affected by the preacher. His answer was, ‘At any 
other time, friend Hopkinson, I would lend thee 
freely, but not now, for thee seems to be out of thy 
right senses.’ ” 

This was by no means the only occasion when 
Whitefield almost lifted the people out of their 
“right senses” by his moving appeals for the or- 
phans. One day in Boston he received more than 
a thousand pounds. This may have been the time 
when “Old Father Flynt,” as the students called 
him, had his experience. He was a member of the 
Harvard faculty and was well known for his par- 
simony. One day he yielded to the request of an- 
other officer of the College and went to hear White- 
field preach. He was so swept away by the elo- 
quence of the hour that when the collection was 
taken almost unconsciously he drew a bill from his 
pocket and dropped it in the box. On his way 
home he scarcely opened his mouth, and when a 
student asked how he liked Whitefield, he roared: 
“Like him! why the dog has robbed me of a five- 
pound note!” 

His foes were constantly assailing him at this 
point. One of them issued a public warning in 
which he amiably remarked: “Let all good people 
beware of this stroller, for he will yet find a way to 


wheedle you out of your money. He is as artful 
| 154 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


a mountebank as any I know.” No doubt the writer 
was ignorant of the fact that every penny of the 
collections, together with a considerable part of 
Whitefield’s own meager resources, went to the 
Georgia work that was so dear to his heart. 

Through all the years Whitefield sought, in a 
wise and loving spirit, to draw Franklin closer to 
God. In a letter from London, in 1752, he wrote: 
“I find that you grow more and more famous in 
the learned world. As you have made a pretty con- 
siderable progress in the mysteries of electricity, 
I would now humbly recommend to your diligent 
unprejudiced pursuit and study the mysteries of 
the New Birth. It is a most important, interesting 
study, and when mastered, will richly answer and 
repay for all your pains. . . . You will excuse this 
freedom. I must have aliquid Christi [something 
of Christ] in all my letters.” 

What was probably the last letter he wrote to 
him closed with the words: “Ere long . . . angels 
shall summon us to attend on the funeral of time, 
and we shall see eternity rising out of its ashes. 
That you and I may be in the happy number of 
those who . . . shall cry ‘Amen! Hallelujah!’ is 
the hearty prayer of, my dear Doctor, yours, etc., 
George Whitefield.’ After Whitefield died, 
Franklin wrote of him: “Our friendship was sin- 
cere on both sides, and lasted to his death. He used 
sometimes to pray for my conversion, but never had 


the satisfaction of believing that his prayers were 
155 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


heard. Upon one of his arrivals from England 
at Boston he wrote to me that he should come soon 
to Philadelphia, but knew not where he could lodge 
when there, as his old friend and host, Mr. Benezet, 
was removed to German Town. My answer was: 
“You know my house. If you can make shift with 
its scanty accommodations, you will be most heart- 
ily welcome.’ He replied that, if I had made that 
kind offer for Christ’s sake, I should not miss of a 
reward. And I returned, ‘Don’t let me be mis- 
taken; it is not for Christ’s sake, but for your sake! 
This incident will show the terms on which we 
stood.” 

But though Whitefield’s prayers were not fully 
answered, we have reason to believe that no one 
influenced the religious life of Franklin as did he. 
Franklin thoroughly believed in him. As he once 
said to his own brother John, “He is a good man 
and I love him.” When the news reached Phila- 
delphia that Whitefield was dead, his old-time 
friend was deeply moved, and with a full heart he 
penned these lines: “I knew him intimately up- 
ward of thirty years. His integrity, disinterested- 
ness, and indefatigable zeal in prosecuting every 
good work I have never seen equaled, and shall 
never see excelled.” No worthier tribute was ever 
paid to the memory of George Whitefield. 

There was one enterprise to which these two men 
were linked up which developed far beyond any 


hope or dream. Soon after Whitefield first came 
156 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


to Philadelphia several of the clergymen became 
offended with him and withdrew permission for him 
to use their pulpits. Weather conditions often 
made open-air preaching impracticable, and in 
order that a place of suitable size should always be 
available when he was in town, a group of his 
friends decided, in 1740, to erect a building, pri- 
marily for Whitefield himself, but which on oc- 
casion might be used by other ministers. 

At the same time the trustees, knowing the young 
preacher’s intense interest in the religious education 
of neglected children, and the work he was planning 
to do in Georgia, organized what they described as 
“A Charity School, for the instruction of poor chil- 
dren gratis, in useful literature and the knowledge 
of the Christian religion.” Whitefield was made a 
trustee, and was commissioned to select a Master 
and Mistress. ‘The school was to be housed in the 
“New Building,” as it was called; but for some 
reason, probably lack of funds, the teaching pro- 
ject did not at once materialize. In the meantime 
Benjamin Franklin was trying to interest the citi- 
zens of Philadelphia in the founding of a regular 
Academy. In 1749 matters came to a head, and, 
in looking around for a place to house the students, 
the trustees of the Academy arranged with the 
trustees of the “New Building” to take over the 
property, agreeing to pay off a burdensome debt, 
reserve a place for preaching, and maintain the 


Charity School. ‘The deed of transfer used the 
157 


RANGING AND HUNTING 


very words quoted above. The new plan received 
Whitefield’s hearty approval. The Academy was 
opened; in 1755 it was incorporated as the College 
of Philadelphia, and in 1791 it became the Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania. ‘The interesting and sig- 
nificant fact is that in all the changes the original 
language of the Charity School was carried along, 
and these identical words appear in the present 
charter of the University. In 1877 the Charity 
School itself was given up as no longer needed, but 
in its place a sum of money is expended annually in 
the free education of young men, not otherwise able 
to pay for tuition, and so the charter provision is 
being carried out. ‘Thus this famous institution is 
directly linked with the projected school of 1740, 
with which Whitefield was so intimately connected. 
It is eminently fitting that in the dormitory trian- 
gle of the University, where thousands of students 
pass it daily, there should stand a handsome bronze 
statue of Whitefield. It was erected in 1919 by 
alumni of the University who are ministers and 
laymen of the Methodist Church, and it shows the 
young preacher as he appeared on his first visit to 
Philadelphia. 


168 


CHAPTER X 
WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


Lo! by the Merrimack WHITEFIELD stands 

In the temple that never was made by hands, 

Curtains of azure, and crystal wall, 

And dome of the sunshine over all! 

A homeless pilgrim, with dubious name 

Blown about on the winds of fame; 

Now as an angel of blessing classed, 

And now as a mad enthusiast. 

Called in his youth to sound and gauge 

The moral lapse of his race and age, 

And, sharp as truth, the contrast draw 

Of human frailty and human law; 

Possessed by the one dread thought that lent 

Its goad to his fiery Temperament, 

Up and down the world he went, 

A John the Baptist crying, “Repent!” 
—From Whittier’s “The Preacher.” 


I would not but be a poor, despised minister of Jesus 
Christ for ten thousand worlds. 


CHAPTER X 
WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


“E.vERY one hath his proper gift,” Whitefield 
once said. He was thinking of himself and of his 
own work and methods. He was not a theologian, 
he was not an organizer or administrator; he was 
not even a sermonizer, in the technical sense; but he 
“vas a preacher, and he knew it. For thirty-four 
years his Pauline constancy of purpose never wa- 
vered—*“This one thing I do.” He had seen the 
vision and heard the call, and he was not dis- 
obedient. 

Whitefield had an extraordinary voice; he could 
adapt it to a dozen people in a private house, and 
the next moment he could step out of doors and 
speak to tens of thousands. He never lacked vocal 
power, and he believed in using it. He once said: | 
“T love those that thunder out the word. The Chris- 
tian world is in a dead sleep. Nothing but a loud 
voice can awaken them out of it.”” Tradition relates 
that once when preaching near the river-front in 
Philadelphia he was heard at Gloucester Point, two 
miles distant by water; and another time his words 
carried so distinctly that a man a mile away was 
converted under the message. 

But quality counted far more than mere volume. 


Whitefield’s enunciation was faultless, every word 
161 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


clean-cut as a crystal. And, most of all, he had in 
its fullness what so many speakers are happy to 
possess in moderate degree, a melody of utterance 
that fascinated his hearers. His voice was al- 
ways under perfect control. Of rich compass, the 
music passed through the whole diapason, from the 
song of the bird to the mighty oratund of Niagara’s 
roar. Such a gift was natural, art could never have 
acquired it. No one knew its worth better than 
David Garrick. ‘The great actor once said, “I 
would give a hundred guineas if I could only say 
‘Ohl like Mr. Whitefield’; and he remarked to 
a friend that if Whitefield were on the stage, he 
could make an audience weep or tremble by his 
varied utterance of the word “Mesopotamia.” 
We talk of a “speaking” face. Whitefield’s face 
was a magazine of eloquence. As people watched 
him they were spellbound, not only by his words but 
by the extraordinary play of the passions of the 
soul in his eyes and in every feature. Had he been 
stricken dumb he could have continued to preach. 
He was a born actor. We have already seen how 
fond he was as a schoolboy of engaging in theatri- 
cal exhibitions. Many have thought that before the 
footlights he would have eclipsed Garrick himself. 
Certain it is that no preacher of his age, if, indeed, 
of any age, equaled him in histrionic power. He 
knew the untold value of a good delivery in holding 
people’s attention, and he thought it was no won- 


der that so many churches in England were empty, 
162 





ELPHIA Court Housr 


AD 


Orpr Pain 









































WHITEFIELD’S CHARITY SCHOOL 





WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


when the preachers droned out their sermons in 
such wretched style. He almost wept as he recalled 
liow the whole subject was ignored at Oxford, and 
he never ceased to urge the study of oratory in the 
American colleges. 

He himself was a life-long student of the art of 
public speech. Nature had been very good to him, 
but that was not enough. In voice, gesture, and 
general manner he constantly strove to reach per- 
fection. Itinerating as he was, he had the great 
advantage of being able to use the same sermon 
over and over. Garrick and Foote were agreed 
that his oratory was not at its full height till he had 
repeated a sermon at least forty times. Franklin 
tells us that “By hearing him often, I came to dis- 
tinguish easily between sermons newly composed 
and those he had preached often in the course of 
his travels. His delivery of the latter was so im- 
proved by frequent repetition that every accent, 
every emphasis, every modulation of voice was so 
perfectly tuned and well-placed that, without be- 
ing interested in the subject, one could not help be- 
ing pleased with the discourse.”” Whitefield might 
easily have run into an artificial style and his his- 
trionic manner have become extremely offensive, 
had it not been for his utter sincerity and his spirit- 
ual passion. With all his attention to the arts of 
speech he never lost his naturalness. Obedient to 
the laws of good delivery, he never sacrificed his 


freedom. He was always himself, and yet not him- 
163 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


self, for in word and manner he spake as the Spirit 
gave him utterance. This explains the fact that 
his sublimest flights were unpremeditated. When 
he began a sermon, neither he nor his hearers knew 
to what altitudes the passion of the hour might 
sweep him. Is not this the soul of eloquence? 

He valued good speaking, but he stressed it only 
as a means toward an end. He was an orator, but 
far more, he sought. to be a prophet. It was his 
life maxim “‘to preach as Apelles painted, for Hter- 
mty.’ He often repeated Paul’s words: “Neces- 
sity is laid upon me, and woe is unto me if I preach 
not the gospel!’ He praised sermons well-deliv- 
ered and enriched with “rational arguments” and 
“rhetoric,” but “I would as soon go to yonder 
churchyard and attempt to raise the dead with a 
‘Come forth! as to preach to dead souls” if there 
was no heavenly Power present. The Whitefield 
of the marvelous voice would have been as “sound- 
ing brass or a tinkling cymbal” had it not been for 
_ the indwelling unction of the Holy One. His hear- 
ers felt it as they listened. Doctor Smalley, when 
a mere boy, heard him, and he used to relate how “I 
could not keep my eyes off from him. I saw him in 
his prayer, his eyes wide open, looking on high; and 
I certainly thought that he saw the Great Being 
up there, with whom he was talking and pleading 
so earnestly.”” When he came before his auditors 
he looked like one who had been with God. This 


it was that won for him the title, “Seraphic.” 
164 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


Cornelius Winter, a young man converted in 
Whitefield’s later ministry, and for eighteen 
months an inmate of his London home, was able to 
observe the great preacher’s habits at close range. 
He tells us that “the time Mr. Whitefield set apart 
for preparation for the pulpit, during my connec- 
tion with him, was not distinguished from the time 
he appropriated to other business. ... He was 
never more in retirement on a Saturday than on an- 
other day, nor sequestered at any particular time 
for a period longer than he used for his ordinary de- 
votions. I never met with anything like a skeleton 
of a sermon among his papers—and I believe he 
knew nothing of such a kind of exercise as the plan- 
ning of a sermon.” 

“Usually for an hour or two before he entered 
the pulpit he claimed retirement; and, on the Sab- 
bath morning especially, he was accustomed to have 
Clarke’s Bible, Matthew Henry’s Comment, and 
Cruden’s Concordance within his reach. His frame 
at that time was more than ordinarily devotional.” 

“His rest was much interrupted, and he often 
said at the close of an address, ‘I got this sermon 
when most of you were fast asleep.’ He made very 
minute observations; and, in one way or another, 
the occurrences of the week, or of the day, furnished 
him with matter for the pulpit....I hardly 
ever knew him to go through a sermon without 
weeping, . . . and I have heard him say in the 


pulpit, ‘You blame me for weeping, but how can I 
165 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


help it, when you will not weep for yourselves, 
though your souls are upon the verge of destruc- 
tion, and, for aught I know, you are hearing your 
last sermon? ” 

Ordinarily, when preaching, he wore a gown, and 
frequently he used the Prayer Book, but he al- 
lowed no formalities to fetter him. He was mighty 
in extempore prayer. Ifa pulpit was at hand, good 
and well; but he was equally at home on a table, 
a tub, a horseblock, the steps of an inn, the stairs 
of a windmill, or a bit of rising ground. It was a 
perpetual wonder as well as delight to his hearers 
that he never read his sermons, something almost 
unheard of in those days. Picture Whitefield with 
eyes glued to a manuscript! He had a very easy 
flow of language. Friends who heard him many 
times often remarked that they never knew him to 
stumble or hesitate for a word. He carried with 
him a small memorandum book in which he kept a 
record of sermons preached, date, and text. This 
shows a total of eighteen thousand for a period of 
thirty-four years, or about ten a week; but if al- 
lowance be made for the intervals when, on account 
of ill health, he was unable to preach, the weekly 
average would be considerably greater. Of course 
this does not take into account the unnumbered 
times when he gave briefer and less formal ex- 
hortations. 

Like John Wesley, but with even greater suc- 


cess, he strove never to preach over people’s heads. 
166 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


His style was adapted to the time and place. At 
the six o'clock morning hour he was more collo- 
quial; at the later Sunday morning service he dealt 
largely in doctrinal teaching, while in the after- 
noon and evening he went on a definite quest for 
souls. He once said, “I am no great friend to long 
sermons, long prayers, or long hymns.” As to 
hymns he held true, and in the collection prepared ° 
for the London Tabernacle he admitted very few 
with more than three or four stanzas. But in the 
matter of sermons—well, it depends upon what is 
meant by “long.” Except in the early morning he 
usually preached an hour, sometimes twice that. 
And yet the crowds came. After all, the length of 
sermons is to be measured more by quality than by 
quantity. 

As has already been said, Whitefield was glad 
to preach anywhere, and he was often very effective 
in parlor gatherings; but it required large dimen- 
sions to put him at his best. Give him God’s out of 
doors, and a vast multitude of eager listeners, their 
“souls sitting in their eyes’—then he was supreme. 
As he so often said, “Mounts are the best pulpits, 
and heaven the best sounding-board.”’ 

When a young man Whitefield had the good 
sense to make it a life rule “simply to preach the 
pure gospel, and not to meddle at all with con- 
troversy.” ‘This not only saved him untold trouble 
but it added immensely to his pulpit effectiveness. 


He suited his sermons to the occasion. He preached 
167 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


to a society of young women on “Christ the Best 
Husband.” He appealed to an audience of sea- 
men to handle their lives with the same care that 
they handled the sails. His subjects were timely 
and practical, such as: “Britain’s Duty,” “Worldly 
Business,” “Profane Cursing and Swearing,” “The 
Heinous Sin of Drunkenness,”’ “The Best New 
Year’s Gift,” “Family Religion,” “The Benefits 
of Early Piety,’ “The Almost Christian,” “Satan’s 
Devices.” 

His preaching was picturesque and often in- 
tensely dramatic. Sometimes in the middle of 
a sermon he would electrify a crowd with the strik- 
ing apostrophe used by Jeremiah, “O earth, earth, 
earth, hear the words of the Lord!’ It is said that 
on one occasion, when he was preaching in the open, 
this was heard a mile and a half away. 

He is speaking on the parable of the Great Sup- 
per, with the various excuses made by those who 
declined the invitation: “The excuse which the 
third made is worst of all. ... Why cannot he 
come? He has ‘married a wife.’ Has he so? Why, 
then, by all means he should come. For the supper 
to which he was invited, as it should seem, was a 
wedding-supper, and would have saved him the 
trouble of a nuptial entertainment. It was a great 
supper, and consequently there was _ provision 
enough for him and his bride too, And it was made 
by a great man, who sent out his servant to bid 


many, so that he need not have doubted of meet- 
168 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


ing with a hearty welcome, though he should bring 
his wife with him. Or, supposing his wife was un- 
willing to come, yet as the husband is the head of 
the wife, he ought to have laid his commands on 
her to accompany him. For we cannot do better 
for our yoke-fellows than to bring them to the gos- 
pel-feast. Or, supposing after all, she would not 
be prevailed upon, he ought to have gone without 
her. Adam paid dear for hearkening to the voice 
of his wife; and sometimes, unless we forsake wives 
as well as houses and lands, we cannot be the Lord’s 
disciples.” | 
Whitefield was fond of adding a graphic touch 
by directly addressing a person, especially a biblical 
character. ‘Take, for example, the scene on the 
Mount of Transfiguration: “Peter, when he had. 
drunk a little of Christ’s new wine, speaks like a 
person intoxicated; he was overpowered with the 
brightness of the manifestation. ‘Let us make 
three tabernacles, one for thee, and one for Moses, 
and one for Elias.’ It is well added, ‘not knowing 
what he said.’ That he should cry out, ‘Master, it 
is good for us to be here,’ in such good company, 
and in so glorious a condition, is no wonder; which 
of us all would not have been apt to have done the 
same? But to talk of building tabernacles, and one 
for Christ and one for Moses and one for Elias, 
was saying something for which Peter himself must 
stand reproved. Surely, Peter, thou wast not quite 


awake! ‘Thou talkest like one ina dream. If thy 
169 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Lord had taken thee at thy word, what a poor tab- 
ernacle wouldst thou have had, in comparison of 
that house not made with hands, eternal in the heav- 
ens, in which thou hast long since dwelt, now the 
earthly house of the tabernacle of thy body is dis- 
solved! What! Build tabernacles below, and have 
the crown before thou hast borne the cross? And 
why so selfish, Peter? Carest thou not for thy fel- 
low disciples that are below, who came not up with 
thee to the mount? Carest thou not for the precious 
souls that are as sheep having no shepherd, and 
must perish forever unless thy Master descends 
from the mount to teach and to die for them? 
Wouldst thou thus eat thy spiritual morsels alone? 
Besides, if thou art for building tabernacles, why 
must there be three of them, one for Christ, and one 
for Moses, and one for Elias? Are Christ and the 
prophets divided? Do they not sweetly harmonize 
and agree in one? Alas, how unlike is their conver- 
sation to thine! Moses and Elias came down to 
talk of suffering, and thou art dreaming of build- 
ing I know not what tabernacles. Surely, Peter, 
thou art so high upon the mount that thy head runs 
giddy.” 

In another sermon we find a characteristic de- 
scription of Peter’s remorse after denying the Mas- 
ter: “Methinks I see him wringing his hands, rend- 
ing his garments, stamping on the ground, and, 
with the self-condemned publican, smiting upon his 


breast. See how it heaves! O what piteous sighs 
170 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


and groans are those which come from the very bot- 
tom of his heart! Alas! it is too big to speak; but 
his tears, his briny, bitter, repenting tears, plainly 
bespeak this to be the language of his awakened 
soul. ‘Alas! where have I been? On the devil’s 
ground. With whom have I been conversing? 
The devil’s children. What is this that I have done? 
Denied the Lord of glory; with oaths and curses, 
denied that I ever knew him. And now whither 
shall I go, or where shall I hide my guilty head? 
I have sinned against light, I have sinned against 
repeated tokens of his dear, distinguishing and 
heavenly love. I have sinned against repeated 
warnings, resolutions, promises, and vows. I have 
sinned openly in the face of the sun, and in the 
presence of my Master’s enemies, and thereby have 
caused his name to be blasphemed. How can I 
think to be suffered to behold the face of, much less 
to be employed by, the ever-blessed Jesus any 
more? QO Peter! thou hast undone thyself. Justly 
mayest thou be thrown aside like a broken vessel. 
God be merciful to me a sinner?! ” 

Whitefield made telling use of passing events. 
Now and then he chanced to be in a town when a 
criminal had just been tried and sentenced to death. 
Such an incident strongly appealed to his dra- 
matic instinct, and he promptly took advantage of 
the popular excitement to reenact the scene at the 
close of a sermon to obstinate sinners. Having 


provided himself with a black cap he would take 
171 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


the part of the judge. ‘With his eyes full of tears, 
and his heart almost too big to admit of speech, he 
would say, after a momentary pause, ‘I am now 
going to put on my condemning cap. Sinner, I 
must do it. JI must pronounce sentence upon thee.’ 
And then, in a strain of tremendous eloquence, he 
would recite our Lord’s words, ‘Depart, ye cursed, 
into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his 
angels.’”’* Enacted as only Whitefield could do 
it, the effect was overwhelming. 

As has already been said, his sublimest utter- 
ances were usually unpremeditated. More than 
once a thunder-storm furnished the occasion for a 
thrilling outburst. On a Sunday morning, on his 
first visit to Boston, he was preaching to a vast 
throng. “Before he commenced his sermon, long 
darkening columns crowded the bright, sunny sky, 
and swept their dull shadows over the buildings, in 
fearful augury of the storm that was approaching. 
‘See that emblem of human life,’ said he, as he 
pointed to a flitting shadow. ‘It paused for a mo- 
ment, and concealed the brightness of heaven from 
our view; but it is gone. And where will you be, 
my hearers, when your lives are passed away like 
that dark cloud? . . . ‘O sinner! by all your hopes 
of happiness, I beseech you to repent. Let not 
the wrath of God be awakened! Let not the fires 
of eternity be kindled against you! See there!’ 
said the impassioned preacher, pointing to a flash of 


1Winter’s Memoirs. 
172 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


lightning, ‘It is a glance from the angry eye of 
Jehovah?! continued he, raising his finger in a lis- 
tening attitude, as the thunder broke in a tre- 
mendous crash, ‘it was the voice of the Almighty 
as he passed by in his anger!’ As the sound died 
away, Whitefield covered his face with his hands, 
and fell on his knees, apparently lost in prayer. 
The storm passed rapidly by, and the sun, bursting 
forth, threw across the heavens the magnificent arch 
of peace. Rising and pointing to it, the young 
preacher cried, ‘Look upon the rainbow, and praise 
Him who made it. Very beautiful it is in the bright- 
ness thereof. It compasseth the heavens about with 
glory, and the hands of the Most High have 
bended it.’ ”’? 

When friends requested a copy of this sermon 
for publication, Whitefield replied, “I have no ob- 
jection, if you will print the hghtning, thunder, and 
rainbow with it.” 

It is astonishing and yet not to be wondered at, 
the way Whitefield gripped the attention of his 
hearers. A well-known shipbuilder, who was 
prejudiced against him, and who had refused to 
go near him, was finally persuaded to attend a 
service. From the first word to the last his eyes 
were riveted on the preacher. At the close a friend 
said to him, “And what did you think of White- 
field?” 

“Think!?’ he exclaimed, “I never heard such a 
; 2Wakeley’s Anecdotes of ears 

17 





WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


man in my life. I tell you, sir, every Sunday when 
I go to church, I can build a ship from stem to stern 
under the sermon; but, were it to save my soul, 
under Mr. Whitefield, I could not lay a single 
plank.” 

Among the nobility of England there were few 
who admired the great preacher more than Lord 
Chesterfield. On one occasion Whitefield “was 
comparing the benighted sinner to a blind beggar 
on a dangerous road. His little dog gets away 
from him when skirting the edge of a precipice, 
and he is left to explore the path with his ironshod 
staff. On the very verge of the cliff this blind guide 
slips through his fingers and skims away down the 
abyss. All unconscious, the owner stoops down to 
regain it, and stumbling forward—‘Good God, he 
is gone!’ shouted Chesterfield, who had been watch- 
ing with breathless alarm the blind man’s move- 
ments, and who jumped to his feet to save the 
catastrophe.’ 

Certainly the philosopher, David Hume, was not 
a man to be easily swayed by any preacher, and yet 
so fond was he of Whitefield that in a day when 
traveling was hard he declared that he would go 
twenty miles to hear him. Hume tells us that he 
was once present when “Whitefield addressed his 
audience thus: “The attendant angel is about to 
leave us, and ascend to heaven. Shall he ascend 
and not bear with him the news of: one sinner re- 





3 Related by the Rev. Dr. James Hamilton, of London. 
174 


WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


claimed from the error of his way? And then, 
stamping with his foot, and lifting up his hands and 
eyes to heaven, he cried aloud, ‘Stop, Gabriel, stop, 
ere you enter the sacred portals, and yet carry with 
you the tidings of one sinner being saved!’ This 
address surpassed anything I ever saw or heard in 
any other preacher.” We cannot help wondering 
if on that memorable occasion the great infidel was 
not moved by more than the mere eloquence, moved 
more deeply, perhaps, than he cared to confess. 
We read so much of Whitefield’s brilliant pulpit 
successes that we are apt to infer that he was uni- 
formly triumphant. Not so. He would have been 
more than human had he always been able to lift 
his hearers to the mountaintop. He had his fail- 
ures and many of them. We hear him saying one 
day, “Preached to a polite auditory, and so very 
unconcerned that I began to question whether I had 
been preaching to rational or brute creatures.” 
Very often the people sat before him like “dead 
stocks.” No doubt at times the “atmosphere” was 
unfriendly, but we gravely suspect that more than 
once the fault was in the pulpit rather than in the 
pew. Like other preachers, Whitefield could be 
dull, and when he was dull, the inevitable followed 
—he lost the crowd. Now and then he used drastic 
means to gain the mastery. One Sunday “a young 
man, a member of the College [ Princeton], hear- 
ing that Whitefield was to preach in the neighbor- 


hood, and being more than a little anxious to ascer- 
115 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


tain whether he really deserved all the celebrity 
he enjoyed, went to hear him. ‘The day was very 
rainy and the audience was small; the preacher, 
accustomed to address thousands, did not feel his 
power called forth as at other times. After having 
heard about one third part of the sermon the young 
man said to himself, “This man is not so great a 
wonder after all—quite commonplace and super- 
ficial—nothing but .show, and not a great deal of 
that’; and looking round upon the audience, he saw 
that they appeared about as uninterested as usual, 
and that old Father , who sat directly in front 
of the pulpit, and who always went to sleep after 
hearing the text and plan of the sermon, was en- 
joying his accustomed nap. About this time 
Whitefield stopped. His face went rapidly through 
many changes, till it looked more like a rising thun- 
der-cloud than anything else; and beginning very 
deliberately, he said: ‘If I had come to speak to you 
in my own name, you might rest your elbows upon 
your knees, and your heads upon your hands, and 
sleep; and once in a while look up and say, “What 
does the babbler talk of?’ But I have not come to 
you in my own name. No, I have come to you in 
the name of the Lord God of Hosts, and’—here he 
brought down his hand and foot at once, so as to 
make the whole house ring—‘and I must and will 
be heard!’ Everyone in the house started, and old 
Father among the rest. “Aye, aye,’ contin- 


ued the preacher, looking at him, ‘I have waked you 
176 











WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


up, have If I meant to doit. I am not come here 
to preach to stocks and stones; I am come to you 
in the name of the Lord God of Hosts, and I must 
and I will have an audience.’ The congregation 
was fully aroused, and the remaining ‘part of the 
sermon produced a considerable effect.’ 

No man could preach as Whitefield did without 
paying the price. Often after leaving the pulpit he 
vomited blood, and those who knew him intimately 
tell us that “after a preaching paroxysm, he lay — 
panting on his couch, spent, breathless, and death- 
like.” And yet he always contended, and probably 
he was right, that this pulpit exercise was in the 
end a physical benefit. He called preaching his 
“grand catholicon’—the remedy for every ailment. 
_ Whitefield’s sermons read poorly, and it is not sur- 
prising. All told, he prepared sixty-three for the 
press, and of these at least forty-six were written 
before he was twenty-five years of age. It is to 
these early efforts, chiefly, that we turn to form an 
estimate of the man’s thought and style; and as we 
read we marvel that they so enraptured the people 
who heard them. It would not especially improve 
matters if we had all of his sermons before us, for 
the truth is that no preacher ever lived who was so 
poorly revealed in type as was he. Alas, that no 
art can print “the lightning, thunder, and rain- 
bow”! The world does not know, nor can it know, 
the real Whitefield the Preacher. The surpassing 

4Belcher’s Life of Whitefield, p. cae 
77 





WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


voice, the eloquent face, the form that spoke in 
every motion, the living personality that glowed 
with celestial fire—all this has passed away forever, 
and we must depend on cold tradition. No doubt 
it would be better for Whitefield’s reputation if 
none of his sermons had been printed. Even 
Franklin, who was eager to publish them as a busi- 
ness proposition, and whose presses were kept busy 
trying to meet the demand, more than once ad- > 
mitted that they did the writer no credit. And yet, 
in spite of their mediocre character, they were used 
of God in blessing a multitude of lives. ‘They cir- 
culated widely on both sides of the Atlantic. They 
were read by individuals, by families, and in larger 
circles, and they carried the message to many who 
could never have been reached by the living voice. 
Take a single example. In those early times, 
religion in the colony of Virginia was at a very low 
ebb. A young layman, Samuel Morris, became 
burdened with the need of a revival, and he longed 
to help. One day, in 1748, there fell into his hands 
a volume of Whitefield’s sermons. Here was his 
chance. He could not preach but he could read, 
and calling his neighbors to his own house he began 
reading to them these sermons. ‘The effect was 
immediate. He tells us that “the concern of some 
of the people was now so passionate and violent 
that they could not avoid crying out and weeping 
bitterly. My dwelling house became too small to 


contain the congregation, and we determined to 
178 





WHITEFIELD’S FIELD-PULPIT 





WHITEFIELD THE PREACHER 


build a meetinghouse, merely for reading.” This 
led to the introduction of Presbyterianism and to 
its spread all over the colony. It marked the dawn 
of a new religious day. 

The question is often asked, “Would White- 
field’s preaching produce the same impression now 
that it did in the eighteenth century?” No, if what 
is meant is a mere transference of sermons and de- 
livery from that generation to this, any more than 
the Whitefield style of dress would be regarded 
with favor to-day. ‘Times change, and while truth 
remains the same, forms and expression are altered. 
But is it not fair to assume that, since Whitefield 
was so successful in adapting himself to the age in 
which he lived, he would be no less able to fit into 
the needs of the twentieth century? Doubtless 
some parts of his message would receive a new 
theological setting, and his pulpit language and 
manner might be modified. But, given the same 
prophetic vision with the same glad obedience to 
that vision, the same extraordinary qualities and 
gifts of heart and mind and body, the same world 
of sin and sorrow, only immensely bigger and more 
conscious of its need—may we not suppose that 
God would make as large use of his servant in these 
days as nearly two hundred years ago? At all 
events, we wish that Whitefield were here; we 
would like to see what would happen. 


179 





yi) 


w 





CHAPTER XI 
WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


Dare to be singularly good. 

Why should we be dwarfs in holiness? 

There is not a thing on the face of the earth that I 
abhor so much as idleness or idle people. 


I expect to see you once more in this land of the dying. 
If not, ere long I shall meet you in the land of the living. 


CHAPTER XI 
WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


WHITEFIELD was a most lovable man, warm- 
hearted, generous, frank; with no trace of a re- 
vengeful spirit. If he made some enemies, he won 
ten times as many friends; and what is more, he 
clung to his friends and they clung to him; he would 
have perished without them; he feasted on human 
love. He was fond of America, and at the call of 

~ duty he never hesitated to turn his face westward; 
and yet one of the keenest trials of his life was the 
parting from dear ones in the homeland. On an 
early voyage, as the shores of England faded from 
his view, he wrote these words: “Parting seasons 
of late have been to me dying seasons. Surely they 
have broken my very heart.” He said to a friend, 
“In parting from you, I feel that I am being ex- 
ecuted again and again.” Once when he was about 
to sail, several intimate companions sent word they 
would be at the ship to see him off. But he begged 
them not to do so: “I dare not meet you now. I 
cannot bear your coming to me to part from me. 
It cuts me to the heart.” 

— He was impulsive, and he had quarrels, many of 
them, but, like his faults in general, they involved 


the head rather than the heart. If in the wrong, he 
183 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


was prompt to seek forgiveness, and he was ready 
to go almost any length to heal a breach. Long- 
continued enmity was a grief of soul to him, and he 
did his best to avoid it./ No doubt he was thinking 
of what he himself had often done in the counsel 
which he urged on an English gentleman: “My 
very dear Sir, do forgive and forget; and if you 
are conscious you have been too hasty in any re- 
spect, pray send to Mr. B a few lines of love. 
We never lose anything by stooping.” 

Those were disputatious times, and Whitefield 
was embroiled in all manner of theological con- 
troversies, especially in his early ministry. In the 
single year 1739, more than forty pamphlets were 
published against him. Partisan meddlers egged 
him on to more than one needless tilt. Nothing 
seemed to gratify them more than to cause trouble 
between Whitefield and some intimate friend. 
There was no person in the world to whom he owed 
so much in the way of spiritual leadership as to 
John Wesley, a man eleven years his senior and of 
mature Christian experience. And yet, when a 
young fellow of only twenty-six, because of certain 
doctrinal differences, he broke off all relations with 
Wesley, refusing even to give him his hand. How- 
ever, these were mere outbursts of youthful folly. 
The breach was soon healed, and the friendship was 
never again disturbed. Some years later, when 
Wesley lay very sick and it was feared he might 


not live, one of the tenderest letters he received was 
184 






































































































































Sn OLS Ae RENE BORE” LOTION 
Ps Rrcicqepetebropensireesiese CAGES HESS Die» i. 





CHARRETTE ERESTTT RAE 


WHITEFIELD IN 1768 














1 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


from Whitefield, closing with the words, “Your 
most affectionate, sympathizing, and _ afflicted 
younger brother.” JKnowing that the two men dis- 
agreed on certain points of doctrine, a zealous 
partisan of Whitefield asked him one day, “Do you 
think we shall see John Wesley in heaven?” 

“No, sir!’ was the prompt reply. “He will be 
so near the throne and we at such a distance that 
we shall hardly get a sight of him.” ,” 

When Whitefield began his ministry, to all in- 
tents he was an Arminian, but a year or two later 
he announced he was a Calvinist. Contact with 
Presbyterianism in Scotland and America led to 
the change, and in one way it was a practical help, 
for on both sides of the sea it gave him a ready hear- 
ing in a multitude of circles where Wesley would 
have been looked upon as a heretic. And yet all 
through life he preached universal salvation with 
an abandon that, in those days, must have startled 
the strict disciples of the great Genevan. 

The fact is, as we have seen, Whitefield was not 
a theologian, and it is unlikely that he ever thought 
through a system of theology. But with all his 
soul he believed in the glory of God, and Calvin- 
ism’s special emphasis on this point appealed to 
him. He was ready, eager, to sink to any depth of 
abasement and carry humanity with him, in the 
effort to magnify Deity. He wrote to a friend: “I 
hope we shall catch fire from each other and that 


there may be an holy emulation amongst us, who 
185 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


shall most debase man and exalt the Lord Jesus.” 
As Franklin observed, one of his frequent expres- 
sions was, “Man is half a beast and half a devil.” 
Over and over again he described himself as “a 
worm and no man,” “a dead dog,” “a vile, worth- 
less, ungrateful wretch,” “a sink of sin and corrup- 
tion.” His bitterest foes never hurled at him more 
opprobrious epithets than he applied to himself. 
Evidently, he believed that the surest way to honor 
the Creator was to dishonor the creature. 

But whatever Whitefield’s ideas on these points, 
or however closely held, be it said to his credit that 
he rarely if ever preached them in a controversial 
spirit. Huis theology was not of the militant kind, 
and as the years passed he increasingly abhorred 
disputing for disputing’s sake. “We do not dis- 
pute,” he said, “but love. I find more and more 
that truth is great, and however seemingly crushed 
for a while, will in the end prevail”; and as he wrote 
in one of his beautiful letters to Benjamin Frank- 
lin, “Though we cannot agree in principles, yet we 
agree in love.” , 

Whitefield was remarkably broad and tolerant 
in his church sympathies. ‘To the close of his life 
he was a regular priest of the Anglican communion, 
and had he been permitted, no doubt the great bulk 
of his work would have been done in that body. In 
reality it was a Divine Hand that thrust him out. 
Like the founder of Methodism, he was too big: for 


any single branch; he belonged to the Church Uni- 
186 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


versal. The oft-quoted expression, “I look upon 
all the world as my parish,” was used for the first 
time by both Wesley and Whitefield in letters writ- 
ten in the same year, 1739. 

When Whitefield was refused admission to Epis- 
copal pulpits he turned to the Dissenters, who, as a 
rule, welcomed him with open arms. ‘This change 
was especially easy in America, with its freer spirit 
and its strong nonconforming bodies. Without 
surrendering in any measure his place and stand- 
ing in the church of his ordination, through most of 
his life he was virtually a Dissenting minister; and 
yet, as we have seen, he belonged to the whole 
church. He used to exclaim: “Oh, for a mind di- 
vested of all sects, and names, and parties! I care 
not if the name of George Whitefield be banished 
out of the world so that Jesus be exalted in it.” He 
made it his life aim “to strengthen the hands of all, 
of every denomination that preaches Jesus Christ 
in sincerity.” He never uttered nobler words than 
when he said, in one of his sermons, “The Spirit of 
God is the center of unity, and wherever I see the 
image of my Master I never inquire of them their 
opinions. I love all that love the Lord Jesus 
Christ.” 

Such catholicity of soul may be common in these 
days, but it was undreamed of before the Evangel- 
ical Revival. Whitefield was far in advance of the 
times. Even Wesley, with all his breadth of sym- 
pathy, scarcely kept pace with him at this point. 

187 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Whitefield felt at home anywhere. Among church- 
men he was a churchman; among the Presbyterians 
and the other Dissenters of Scotland and America, 
he was a Dissenter. The holy communion was as 
sacred to him with one group as with another. He 
disagreed with the Quakers in some things, but he 
tells of his gleeful accord with the Friend who 
grasped his hand at the close of a sermon, saying: 
“Friend George, I am as thou art. I am for bring- 
ing all to the life and*power of the ever-living God. 
And therefore, if thou wilt not quarrel with me 
about my hat, I will not quarrel with thee about 
thy gown.” One Sunday he invited a Baptist min- 
ister to preach in his stead, joyfully commenting to 
himself, “O bigotry, thou art tumbling down 
apace!’ The story is still told in Philadelphia of 
how, on a certain occasion, when Whitefield was 
preaching from the balcony of the old Courthouse, 
he lifted his eyes and exclaimed: “Father Abraham, 
who have you in heaven? Any Episcopalians? 
‘No.’ Any Presbyterians? ‘No.’ Any Baptists? 
‘No. Any Methodists, Seceders, or Independents? 
‘No, no! Why, who have you there? ‘We don’t 
know those names here. All who are here are Chris- 
tians.’ Qh, is that the case? Then, God help me! 
And God help us all to forget party names, and to 
become Christians in deed and truth.” 

The hardest struggle Whitefield had, all through 
life, but especially as a young man, was to hold his 


balance amid the tide of adulation that swept 
188 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


around him. Anyone would have felt it, and espe- 
cially a person of Whitefield’s emotional nature. 
Often he fell, and no one knew it better than him- 
self. There is a pathetic note in his voice as he 
frankly says, “It is too much for one man to be re- 
ceived as I have been, by thousands.” He lamented 
his “too imperious carriage,” and that a love of 
power had sometimes “intoxicated” him, and made 
him “mistake passion for zeal, and an overbearing 
spirit for an authority given from above.” No of- 
fender could have been more penitent than he, more 
humble in confession, more desirous of mending his 
ways. “I have been much concerned,” he said to a 
fellow clergyman, “lest I behave not with that hu- 
mility toward you which is due from a babe to a 
father in Christ. You know how difficult it is to 
meet with success and not be puffed up with it. 
Pray the Lord to heal my pride.” In letter after 
letter, with childlike simplicity, he pleaded with his 
friends, “Eintreat God to give me humility, so shall 
success not prove my ruin.” Once, receiving a se- 
vere rebuke, instead of resenting it, he meekly 
thanked the writer, and added: “When I am un- 
willing to be told of my faults, correspond with me 
no more. If I know anything of this treacherous 
heart of mine, I love those most who are most faith- 
ful to me in this respect.” At times his enemies 
were unmerciful, brutal, in their assaults, but he 
quietly accepted it. “God be praised for the many 


strippings I have met with. It is good for me that 
189 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


I have been supplanted, despised, censured, ma- 
ligned.” It was a valuable discipline. 

But because Whitefield showed proper humility, 
let no one suppose there was the faintest trace of a 
cringing spirit; his whole attitude was one of robust 
independence. Some one took him to task on the 
ground that he paid too much attention to his dress. 
‘Alas!’ he replied, “I myself thought once that 
Christianity required me to go nasty. I neglected 
myself as much as you would have me; but when 
God gave me the spirit of adoption, I then dressed 
decently, as you call it, out of principle.” When a 
clergyman wrote him, impertinently asking to be 
informed how often he prayed and prescribing cer- 
tain rules, Whitefield replied: “Morning and eve- 
ning retirement is certainly exceeding good; but if 
through weakness of body, or frequency of preach- 
ing, I cannot go to God in my usual set time, I 
think my spirit is not in bondage. It is not for me 
to tell how often I use secret prayer.” As a matter 
of fact, it was often, but he was not given to long 
prayers, nor did he like them from others. One 
day, when visiting at the home of a friend, the 
friend prayed so long that Whitefield got off his 
knees and sat down in a chair. At the close of 
the prayer, he exclaimed, “Sir, you prayed me 
into a good frame, and you prayed me out of it 
again.” 

Cornelius Winter, the young man quoted in the 


preceding chapter, who in the closing part of 
190 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


Whitefield’s life was an inmate of the London 
home, eating at the same table and sleeping in the 
same room with the great preacher, has left us an 
account of some of the personal habits of his mas- 
ter: “Mr. Whitefield was accessible but to few. He 
was cautious in admitting people to him. He 
would never be surprised into a conversation. You 
could not knock at his door and be allowed to enter 
at any time. ‘Who is it? “What is his business? 
and such-like inquiries usually preceded admission ; 
and, if admission was granted, it was then: ‘Come 
to-morrow morning at six o’clock, perhaps five, or 
unmediately after preaching. If later, I cannot see 
you.’ ” 

“No time was to be wasted, and his expectations 
usually went before the ability of his servants to 
perform his commands. He was very exact to the 
time appointed for his stated meals. A few min- 
utes’ delay would be considered a great fault. He 
was irritable, but soon appeased. Not being pa- 
tient enough, one day, to receive a reason for his 
being disappointed, he hurt the mind of one who 
was studious to please; but, on reflection, he burst 
into tears, saying, ‘I shall live to be a poor, peevish 
old man, and everybody will be tired of me.’”’ This 
irritability of temper grew upon him in the later 
years of his life. Doubtless it was due in large 
measure to persistent ill health, but it was a grief of 
soul to him. With touching candor he said: “I 
have nothing to disturb my joy in God but the dis- 

191 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


order of my passions; were these once brought into 
proper subjection to divine grace, well would it be 
with me and happy should I be. But so long as I 
am angry with trifles, and throw myself into need- 
less disorders, so long must my heart be like the 
troubled sea, and so long must I consequently be 
unhappy.” 

Winter goes on to tell us: “He never commanded 
haughtily, and always took care to applaud when 
a person did-right.” He never indulged parties at 
his table, but a select few might now and then 
breakfast with him, dine with him on a Sunday, or 
sup with him on Wednesday night. In the last- 
mentioned indulgence he was scrupulously exact 
to break up in time. In the height of a conversation 
I have known him to abruptly say, ‘But we forget 
ourselves’; and, rising from his seat and advancing 
to the door, would add, ‘Come, gentlemen, it is time 
for all good folks to be at home!’ ” 

“Whether only by himself, or having but a sec- 
ond, his table must be spread elegantly, though it 
produced but a loaf and a cheese. He was unjustly 
charged with being given to appetite. His table 
was never spread with variety. A cow-heel was his 
favorite dish, and I have known him cheerfully say, 
‘How surprised would the world be, if they could 
peep upon Doctor Squintum, and see a cow-heel 
upon his table.” He was extremely neat in his per- 
son, and in everything about him. Not a paper 
must be out of place, or be put up irregularly. 

192 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


Each part of the furniture, likewise, must be in its 
proper position before he retired to rest. He said 
he did not think he should die easy, if he thought 
his gloves were not where they ought to be. There 
was no rest after four in the morning, nor sitting 
up after ten in the evening.” 

“He never made a purchase without paying the 
money immediately. He often dined among his 
friends, and usually connected a comprehensive 
prayer with his thanksgiving when the table was 
dismissed, in which he noticed particular cases rela- 
tive to the family. He never protracted his visit 
long after dinner. He often appeared tired of 
popularity, and said he almost envied the man who 
could take his choice of food at an eating-house, and 
pass unnoticed.” 

Whitefield’s mother died in 1752, while he was 
absent in America. She was a woman of ordinary 
parts, but she loved her son, and in his younger 
days she did for him her very best. He in turn 
showed her the most beautiful devotion. At one 
time he felt worried about her religious condition, 
and he wrote to her very tenderly, “When you come 
to judgment, God will show you how many tears I 
have shed in secret for you. Honored mother, flee 
to Jesus!” Ata later date he wrote, “How does my 
heart burn with love and duty! Gladly would I 
wash your aged feet, and lean upon your neck, and 
weep and pray till I could pray no more.” And he 


sends her “ten thousand hearty and most humble 
193 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


thanks” for all she had done for him. Happy the 
mother of such a son! | 

Whitefield: was married in November, 1741, a 
few days before his twenty-seventh birthday. He 
had been considering the matter for nearly two 
years. His orphanage in Savannah was in need of 
a trustworthy woman to act as matron, and he 
thought a wife would meet the situation. 

More than a year and a half before he was finally 
wedded he took definite steps looking in that di- 
rection. He selected a young woman who he 
thought would do, and then he proposed in a very 
businesslike way. He wrote to the parents, outlin- 
ing his plans, and asking if they felt their daugh- 
ter was a proper person for such an undertaking; 
and in case it met with their approval, they were to 
pass on to her a letter bearing a definite proposal 
of marriage. He added: “You need not be afraid 
of sending me a refusal; for, I bless God, if I know 
anything of my own heart, I am free from that 
foolish passion which the world calls love. I write, 
only because I believe it is the will of God that I 
should alter my state; but your denial will fully 
convince me that your daughter is not the person 
appointed by God for me.” In his letter to the girl 
he plainly told her of the fatigue that would be in- 
volved in taking “charge of a family, consisting 
perhaps of a hundred persons,” the “inclemencies 
of the air,” the long periods of separation when her 


husband would be on his journeys, and then he 
194 


WHITEFIELD THE MAN 


asked her if she would accept him. Needless to 
say that the odd wooings of the young suitor were 
promptly turned down. The woman whom he did 
marry was a widow and ten years his senior. It has 
generally been supposed that the venture turned 
out unhappily, but this is not true. Mrs. White- 
field was an estimable person, and the soul of loy- 
alty to her companion through the twenty-seven 
years of their wedded life. Very wisely, the orphan- 
age plan, for the most part, was discarded, but oc- 
casionally she accompanied her husband on his 
travels both in this country and in England. In 
many ways she was a genuine helpmeet. In his 
letters he refers to her most tenderly, as when he 
says, “My wife and I go on like two happy pilgrims, 
leaning on our Beloved.” There is recorded not a 
single unpleasant word between them. She died 
two years before her husband, and he preached her 
funeral sermon in London. He told what a bless- 
ing she had been to him; and then described in par- 
ticular an experience when he was preaching in the 
field and the crowd was disposed to be riotous: “At 
first I addressed them firmly; but when a desperate 
gang drew near, and with the most ferocious and 
horrid imprecations and menaces, my courage be- 
gan to fail. My wife was then standing behind me, 
as I stood on the table. I think I hear her now. 
She pulled my gown, and looking up, said, ‘George, 
play the man for your God.’ My confidence re-~ 


turned. I spoke to the multitude with boldness and 
195 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


affection. They became still, and many were 
deeply affected.” 

With scarcely an exception, the biographers of 
Whitefield have expressed regret that he ever mar- 
ried. Doubtless the experience was not ideal; the 
utilitarian may have been too prominent; the joy 
of marriage-fellowship was marred by the frequent 
and prolonged separations of husband and wife. 
And yet, we cannot help feeling that the whole life 
of the man was ennobled and made richer, by en- 
tering into a relationship which for him had a sac- 
ramental value; by the coming of a little son, “‘trail- 
ing clouds of glory,” albeit the tarrying was for 
only a few short weeks; and by the consciousness, 
wherever he went, on land and sea, that there was 
one who was praying for him, and to whom he was 
knit by holy ties till death them should part. It 
may be said with absolute confidence that White- 
field’s moral character was above reproach. Prob- 
ably no man of his day met more women of every 
description and under every circumstance, and yet 
his bitterest foes knew there was one point where 
it was useless to assail him; he had a white soul. 


196 


CHAPTER XII 
WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


I would fain die sword in hand. 
O that death may find me either praying or preaching! 
Sudden death is sudden glory. 


Among Christians, death has not only lost its sting, 
but its name. 

The moment I leave the body, and plunge into the 
world of spirits, the first question I shall ask will be— 
Where’s my Saviour? 








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CHAPTER XII 
WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


Tue closing years of Whitefield’s life brought 
trials as well as joys. His enemies seemed to con- 
spire in publishing the most venomous attacks; and 
as if this were not enough, the stage took up the 
assault. In his preaching there was so much of the 
actor’s art that he laid himself peculiarly open to 
mimicry. At one time, in America, a club of young 
rakes had a Negro servant who was very clever in 
impersonating various characters. Whitefield hap- 
pened to be in town and, as usual, was creating a 
great stir. At a meeting of the club the members 
called on the servant to mimic the preacher; at first 
he refused, but, being urged, he sprang on a table, 
and in perfect imitation of voice and manner, cried, 
“T speak the truth in Christ; I lie not; unless you 
repent, you will all be damned!” The effect was so 
startling that it not only broke up the meeting but 
disrupted the club. 

Unhappily, the attacks were not always as harm- 
less. In 1760, Samuel Foote, the English come- 
dian, brought out “The Minor,” a burlesque of 
Whitefield and his followers. It ran for ten years 
and was acted even after Whitefield’s death. It 


was filthy and profane in the extreme, but White- 
199 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


field ignored it. Only twice in his letters does he 
make a passing allusion, as when he says: “Satan 
is angry. I am now mimicked and burlesqued on 
the public stage. All hail such contempt.” Other 
plays, though less important, were written against 
him, but decent people, foes as well as friends, were 
disgusted, and Whitefield came through the trial 
a positive gainer. 

His health was never robust, and, unlike Wesley, 
he did not know how to take care of it. The mar- 
vel is that with a comparatively frail body, he was 
able to do so prodigious a work. But it was a con- 
stant struggle, and as the years passed, the col- 
lapses became increasingly frequent and serious. 
More than once the papers reported that he was 
dead, the first time when he was a young man 
of only thirty-three. For months at a time he was 
almost entirely laid aside, and on several occasions 
it was feared the end was at hand. When he 
sailed for America at the age of thirty-six he was 
so broken that his friends in the homeland never ex- 
pected to see him again. In his letters are constant 
references to “convulsions and fevers” and other 
ailments. Repeatedly, to the dismay of his friends, 
he left a sick-bed to appear in the pulpit. Though 
with the look of a dying man, he would preach with 
great power, and after a brief rest they would lift 
him to the back of his horse, and he would ride on 
to another point where he knew the crowds were ex- 


pecting him. One morning in London Wesley 
200 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


breakfasted with him, and afterward spoke of him 
as “an old, old man, fairly worn out in his Master’s 
service, though he has hardly seen fifty years.” 

As a young man his figure was quite slim, but 
about the age of forty he rapidly put on flesh. This 
was not due to indulgence of appetite, but it was a 
symptom of advancing disease. “I see the disease,” 
he wrote, “but know not how to come at a cure. I 
dread a corpulent body, but it breaks in upon me 
like an armed man.” | 

No doubt his imperfect health was in part re- 
sponsible for a lifelong and almost morbid habit 
of talking about death, and an apparent longing 
for it to come. His letters are full of the subject. 
As a young fellow of twenty-four we find him 
writing, “I want to leap my seventy years.” Ejjac- 
ulations, such as, “Fly, fly, O time! Welcome, 
welcome, long-wished-for eternity!’ were often on 
his lips. He used to say that the hope of bringing 
more souls to Christ was the only consideration that 
reconciled him to life. One day, in company with 
several other ministers, Whitefield was dining with 
his old friend, the Rev. William Tennent, in the 
parsonage in Freehold, New Jersey. After din- 
ner, as often happened, Whitefield expressed his 
joy at the thought of soon dying and being ad- 
mitted into heaven; and, then, appealing to the min- 
isters present, he asked if his Joy was shared by 
them. Generally they assented, but Tennent con- 


tinued silent. ‘Brother Tennent,” said White- 
201 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


field, “you are the oldest man among us; do you not 
rejoice that your being called home is so near at 
hand?” “YT have no wish about it,’ bluntly an- 
swered Tennent. Whitefield pressed his question, 
and Tennent again replied: “No, sir, it is no pleas- 
ure to me at all; and, if you know your duty, it 
would be none to you. I have nothing to do with 
death. My: business is to live as long as I can, and 
as well as I can.” Whitefield was not satisfied, and 
a third time urged the good old man to state 
whether he would not choose to die, if death were 
left to his own choice. “Sir,” answered Tennent, 
“T have no choice about it. I am God’s servant and 
have engaged to do his business as long as he pleases 
to continue me therein. But now, Brother White- 
field, let me ask you a question. What do you 
think I would say, if I were to send my man Tom 
into the field to plow, and if at noon I should find 
him lounging under a tree and complaining, ‘Mas- 
ter, the sun is hot, and the plowing hard, and I am 
weary of my work, and overdone with heat; do, 
master, let me go home and rest’? What would I 
say? Why, that he was a lazy fellow, and that it 
was his business to do the work I had appointed 
him, until I should think fit to call him home.’ 
No doubt Whitefield was impressed by this frank 
rebuke from his faithful friend; and it is equally 
certain that those gathered at the dinner table that 





-1Tyerman’s Life of Whitefield, 2:590. The incident is taken from the 
Evangelical Magazine of 1807. 
202 


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WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


day vividly recalled the incident, when, two months 
later, word came that the Master’s call had been 
received and the great preacher had gone home. 

On September 4, 1769, Whitefield embarked for 
America on his thirteenth and last voyage. With 
his roving nature, unless hindered by ill health, he 
must be constantly on the move, somewhere. As 
he used to say, “No nestling, no nestling on this 
side Jordan”; “A pilgrim life to me is the sweetest 
on this side eternity.’ But he was especially 
anxious to revisit America at this time. He had 
not been there for more than four years, and busi- 
ness connected with the orphanage demanded his 
personal attention. 

His general plan was to go to Georgia, spend 
several months there, placing the orphan work on 
a broader and safer basis; journey leisurely north- 
ward, meeting a host of old-time friends; back once 
more to Savannah, and then a last farewell, return- 
ing to England to remain. 

Before embarking at London he spoke closing 
words of counsel to his own people in the Totten- 
ham Court Road Chapel and in the old Moorfields 
Tabernacle, but as usual, he shunned private fare- 
wells. Writing to one whom he called “My very 
dear, steady old friend,” he said, “Talk not of tak- 
ing a personal leave. You know my make. Paul 
could stand a whipping, but not a weeping fare- 
well.” 

The voyage was long and tempestuous, and it 

203 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


was December before Whitefield reached Georgia. 
In this connection we find a most singular coinci- 
dence. At the Methodist Conference held in Leeds, 
in August, 1769, an appeal was read by John Wes- 
ley from the little company of Methodists in Amer- 
ica, that some one be sent over to shepherd them. 
Richard Boardman and Joseph Pilmoor volun- 
teered to go; and at the very time that Whitefield 
was sailing west for the last time, bringing his min- 
istry to a close, another ship was bearing thither 
these two young missionaries on their first voyage, 
to officially found Methodism on American soil. 

The winter months of 1770 were spent in 
Georgia, and in the spring Whitefield started 
northward, arriving in Philadelphia May 6, and 
slowly pushed on to New England. His journey 
was a triumphal progress; old-time differences were 
forgotten; everywhere he was received with en- 
thusiasm; churches of all names threw open their 
doors in welcome, and he could not begin to accept 
all the preaching calls that poured in. One day 
such a huge pile of letters lay on his table that he 
sent the bundle to England as a curiosity. 

Homes that were privileged to entertain him felt 
signally honored. On all these occasions he was 
the oracle to whom every one gave heed. One day 
he dined with a New Jersey family, where among 
those present was a young man of twenty-two, by 
the name of William White, years afterward dis- 


tinguished as the first bishop of the Protestant 
204 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


Episcopal Church in America. The youth never 
forgot that day and how, all through the meal, his 
eyes were riveted on the visitor. “During dinner,” 
he tells us, Whitefield “was almost the only 
speaker, as was said to be common; all present be- 
ing disposed to listen.” 

The entire month of July was spent on a preach- 
ing tour between New York and Albany. As he 
sailed up the Hudson the scenery delighted him; 
again and again he exclaimed, “O Thou wonder- 
working God!” ‘This was a happy summer for 
him; his health was so much better that he was able 
to preach every day, and constant fellowship with 
loving friends was an unspeakable comfort. 

On July 31 he left New York by water for New- 
port, and then passed overland to Boston, preach- 
ing on the way. Everywhere the same joyful greet- 
ing awaited him. For three days in the middle of 
September he was too sick to preach, but at the 
first possible moment he was again in the pulpit. 

The last letter he ever wrote, addressed to a 
friend in London, was dated September 23, 1770, 
only seven days before his death. ‘The colonies, 
and especially New England, were having serious 
trouble with the mother country over the question 
of taxation. Whitefield’s sympathies were chiefly 
with the Americans, which explains an opening 
reference: “Poor New England is much to be 
pitied; Boston people most of all. How falsely 


misrepresented! I was so ill on Friday, that I 
205 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


could not preach, though thousands were waiting 
to hear. Well, the day of release will shortly come, 
but it does not seem yet, for, by riding sixty miles, 
I am better, and hope to preach here to-morrow. 
.. . O for a warm heart! O to stand fast in the 
faith, to quit ourselves like men, to be strong!” 

On Saturday, September 29, he left Portsmouth, 
New Hampshire, for Newburyport, Massachusetts, 
where he had promised to preach the following 
morning. At the last moment he agreed to stop 
at Exeter and deliver a sermon in the open air. He 
was especially fond of this town, for he remembered 
how once when he was holding a service there, a 
man came, his pockets loaded with stones, and bent 
on mischief. But at the close of the sermon he went 
to the preacher in tears, “Sir,” said he, “I came here 
to-day with the intention of breaking your head, 
but God has given me a broken heart.” As he was 
starting from Portsmouth, a friend said to him, 
“Sir, you are more fit to go to bed than to preach.” 
“True, sir,” Whitefield replied, and then, clasping 
his hands and looking up, he said: “Lord Jesus, I 
am weary in thy work, but not of thy work. If I 
have not yet finished my course, let me go and speak 
for thee once more in the fields, seal thy truth, and 
come home and die.” 

His prayer was answered; strength was given 
him for the Exeter sermon, the last he ever 
preached. No building could hold the crowd, and 


so mounting a hogsshead he spoke in the open. One 
206 | 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


who was present described the scene: “The subject 
was ‘Faith and Works.’ He rose up sluggishly and 
wearily, as if worn down and exhausted by his 
stupendous labors. His face seemed bloated, his 
voice was hoarse, his enunciation heavy. Sentence 
after sentence was thrown off in rough, disjointed 
portions, without much regard to point or beauty. 
At length his mind kindled, ‘and his lionlike voice © 
roared to the extremities of his audience. He was 
speaking of the insufficiency of works to merit sal- 
vation, and suddenly cried out in a tone of thun- 
der, ‘Works! Works! a man get to heaven by 
works! I would as soon think of climbing to the 
moon on a rope of sand!” 

Whenever Whitefield got under way in preach- 
ing, physical weakness was forgotten. On this last 
occasion, though scarcely able to stand when he 
arose, he was filled with such divine energy that he 
spoke for two hours; but he had a presentiment 
that the end was not far distant. As he was closing 
he cried: “I go, I go to rest prepared; my sun has 
arisen, and, by aid from heaven, has given light to 
many. It is now about to set for—no, it is about 
to rise to the zenith of immortal glory. I have out- 
lived many on earth, but they cannot outlive me in 
heaven. Oh, thought divine! I soon shall be in a 
world where time, age, pain, and sorrow are un- 
known. My body fails, my spirit expands. How 
willingly I would live forever to preach Christ! 


But I die to be with him.” 
207 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


Immediately on reaching Newburyport he went 
to the parsonage of the Presbyterian church, where 
he was to be the guest of his beloved friend, the 
Rev. Jonathan Parsons. He was utterly ex- 
hausted, and after an early supper he excused him- 
self and started for his room. But in the meantime 
it had been noised about that he was there, and 
many had gathered in front of the house and were 
even pressing into the hallway, who, as _ they 
caught sight of the great preacher, begged him for 
a short message. Spent as he was, he paused on the 
stairs for a moment, candle in hand, and spoke a 
word of exhortation, and then he went to his 
chamber. | 

Mr. Richard Smith, who accompanied him from 
England and who was with him to the end, de- 
scribes the last scene. Whitefield awoke at two in 
the morning in great distress: “He panted for want 
of breath. I asked him how he felt. He answered, 
‘My asthma is returning; I must have two or three 
days’ rest. Two or three days’ riding without 
preaching, will set me up again.’ ‘Though the 
window had been half up all night, he asked me to 
put it a little higher. ‘I cannot breathe,’ said he, 
‘but I hope I shall be better by and by. A good 
pulpit sweat to-day may give me relief. I shall be 
better after preaching.’ I said to him, I wished 
he would not preach so often. He replied, ‘I had 
rather wear out than rust out.’ He then sat up in 


bed and prayed that God would bless his preaching 
208 








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PULPIT IN OLD SoutH PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, NEWBURYPORT 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


where he had been, and also bless his preaching that 
day, that more souls might be brought to Christ. 
He then lay down to sleep again,” but awoke, suf- 
focating. “He turned to me and said, ‘I am dying.’ 
I said, “I hope not, sir.’ He ran to the other win- 
dow, panting for breath, but could get no relief. I 
went for Dr. Sawyer, and on coming back I saw 
death on his face. . . . When the doctor came and | 
felt his pulse, he said, ‘He is a dead man’—and in- | 
deed so it proved, for he fetched but one gasp, | 
stretched. out his feet, and breathed no more. ‘This 
was exactly at six o'clock” on Sunday morning, 
September 30, 1770. 

Several years prior to this, Whitefield was dining 
one day at the home of President Finley, of Prince- 
ton. “Mr. Whitefield,” said the doctor, “I hope it 
will be very long before you are called home; but 
when that event shall arrive I shall be glad to hear 
the noble testimony you will bear for God.” “You 
will be disappointed,” was the reply. “I shall die 
silent. It has pleased God to enable me to bear so 
many testimonies for him during my life, that he 
will require none from me when I die.” And so it 
was. He left no dying message; none was needed. 
His whole life was an eloquent testimony to the 
divine power to save and to keep. 

Amid the tolling of the bells, and with the flags 
on the ships in the harbor at mourning, the funeral 
was held on Tuesday, October 2. Preachers came 


from every direction. Thousands of people stood 
209 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


in the street, unable to enter the church. The Rev. 
Daniel Rogers, one of Whitefield’s converts, of- 
fered the prayer, and when he came to a point where 
he exclaimed, “O my Father! My Father!” he 
broke down and sobbed like a child. The whole 
audience was in tears. Whitefield was peculiarly 
interested in this church at Newburyport, with 
which he had been associated from its beginning, 
and more than once had expressed the desire that 
should he pass away in that vicinity, he be buried 
beneath the pulpit. His wish was carried out, and 
his body was placed in a newly prepared brick 
vault. 

The news of the death of this mighty servant of 
the Lord carried sorrow throughout the land and 
beyond the sea. Boston bowed in mourning; the 
tolling of the muffled bells of Old Christ Episcopal 
Church expressed something of the grief that Phila- 
delphia felt. Nowhere was the anguish more bitter 
than at the orphanage in Georgia: father, guide, 
protector was gone; the loss was irreparable. 

“The melancholy news,” as Wesley called it, 
reached England on November 5. Whitefield’s 
bosom friend, Robert Keen, of London, once asked 
him: “If you should die abroad, whom shall we get 
to preach your funeral sermon? Must it be your 
old friend, the Rev. Mr. John Wesley?’ At once 
Whitefield replied, ““He is the man.” ‘The choice 
was ideal. Except for a few months when rela- 


tions were strained, the two men had been close and 
210 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


loving friends for thirty-seven years. No one in 
the world understood Whitefield as did Wesley; 
he knew his limitations and he rejoiced in his 
strength. He used to say: “I praise God for his 
wisdom in giving different talents to different 
preachers, and particularly for his giving Mr. 
Whitefield the talents which I have not.” The 
funeral service was held on November 18, in the 
Whitefield Chapel in Tottenham Court Road, and 
as one would expect, Wesley’s sermon did affec- 
tionate and discriminating justice to the memory 
of his friend. Scores of memorial sermons were 
preached all over England as well as in America, 
and the press was full of accounts of the man whom 
even his critics recognized as one of the most ex- 
traordinary preachers in the history of the church. 
The biographer of John Wesley can close his 
narrative by pointing to world-wide Methodism, 
as the visitor to Saint Paul’s Cathedral is bidden 
to look about him if he would see the monument of 
the great architect. Not so with Whitefield. He 
organized no societies, he founded no denomination. 
God called Wesley to one type of work and White- 
field to another, and happily both men knew it. 
Whitefield was not an administrator. “The care 
of all the churches,” which came naturally to Wes- 
ley as it did to Paul, would have been an impossible 
task for him. Rather, like the Baptist, he was a 
“Voice”—and what a Voice! In him the ancient 


prophets lived again, those fearless forth-tellers of 
211 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


the divine Word. But while his incomparable place 
in the pulpit is frankly admitted, it is often said 
that he was a preacher and no more; that he made 
no lasting impression; and that when the echoes of 
the matchless voice died away, little or nothing re- 
mained. Let us see. 

Contrast the Britain of 1736, when Whitefield 
began to preach, with what it later became. Vital 
religion, in pulpit and pew, almost dead; a spiritual 
darkness that could be felt resting on Churchmen 
and Dissenters alike; form and ceremony thrust to 
the fore while the deeper truths of the Kingdom 
were forgotten; a nation famishing for the Bread 
of Life and ignorant of the remedy. And now 
mark the change! The old order passes. Pulpits, 
thousands of them, filled with men of zeal, who 
know whereof they speak, and whose every mes- 
sage bears the divine seal, “Thus saith the Lord!’ 
Churches crowded; multitudes born again; the 
masses of the poor, so long neglected, having the 
gospel preached to them; a new joy, a new hope, 
a new faith, a new life. 

In all this Whitefield had a part. His relative 
place is a small matter; it never concerned him nor 
does it us. Certain it is that he was an apostle of 
the Lord. He was the first to revive the old prac- 
tice of open-air preaching. Up and down England 
he went, and everywhere miracles of grace were 
wrought. At a time when Scotland was drifting 


from her old-time belief in the deity of Jesus, he 
212 





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helped to bring her back to the primitive faith. His 
ministry in Wales was monumental; he did much to 
save the Principality for Christ. 

Even more remarkable perhaps was his work in 
America. Through him the Great Awakening 
spread far and wide. Edwards spoke to a group in 
New England, and the Tennents to a circle around 
Philadelphia; but Whitefield, like a torch in flame, 
swept from Georgia to Maine. His voice never 
faltered, and so insistent was his message that 
finally men’s very souls caught the clarion impera- 
tive, “Ye MUST be born again!’ No one ever 
moved the religious life of America as did he. Wes- 
ley’s influence was immense, but he spoke through 
others; Whitefield’s was the personal touch. When 
passing through Philadelphia for the last time, in 
the spring of 1770, he met Boardman and Pilmoor, 
Wesley’s missionaries, recently arrived, and he 
gave them his blessing. They came at the strategic 
moment. As his work closed, theirs began; he had 
prepared the way. Methodism would never have 
been received as it was, nor have enjoyed the won- 
derful growth of those early years, had it not been 
for Whitefield in making ready the soil. 

A volume might be written on the spiritual 
trophies whom Whitefield won for the Master. 
Thousands were converted under his preaching, 
while scores, if not hundreds, entered the ministry. 
Think of the sources created, whence streams of 


influence flowed out in every direction! To cite a 
218 


WHITEFIELD: PROPHET—PREACHER 


single instance. Two days before his death White- 

field preached in Portsmouth. In the crowd was 
a godless young fellow by the name of Benjamin 
) Randall. He was sobered but not converted. ‘The 
( following Sunday noon a messenger galloped into 
\ town, crying, “Whitefield is dead!’ Randall 
/heard him, and long afterward wrote, “A voice 
-sounded through my soul, more loud and startling 
than ever thunder pealed upon my ears, ‘White- _ 
field is dead!’ Whitefield is now in heaven, but I 
,am on the road to hell. O that I could hear his 
_/ voice again!” 'The young man gave himself wholly 
to Christ, entered the ministry, and became the 
founder of the Free Will Baptists. 

At a time when philanthropies were few, and 
most men were indifferent to their brothers’ needs, 
Whitefield went everywhere, pouring out his elo- 
quent appeals for the distressed, especially for or- 
phaned children. In both England and America 
he started a new tide of benevolence. He appeared 
to be the friend of slavery, this most tender- 
hearted of men. But it is interesting to remember 
that in 1769, shortly before he left England for the 
last time, a ten-year-old boy was led to Christ 
through his ministry, and that in after years this 
same lad became the world-leader in destroying 
slavery—William Wilberforce. 

His activity on behalf of Christian education 
never ceased. We have only to remember his 


warm interest in Harvard and Yale, his place in the 
214 


WHITEFIELD TRIUMPHANT 


early history of the University of Pennsylvania, 
and the interesting fact that both Princeton and 
Dartmouth were founded by his friends and fol- 
lowers. 

A preacher? Yes, and much more. For his 
words were transmuted into works whose influence 
will abide to the end of time. 


215 


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INDEX 


Act of Uniformity and its results, 21, 37 
America, customs in Colonial days, 128, 133 
America, religion in Colonial days, 136-140 
Atlantic Ocean and its perils, 57-59 
Awakening, the Great, in America, 138 


Bath, Whitefield’s preaching successes, 49 

Baxter, Richard, couplet on preaching, 93 

Belcher, Governor, and Whitefield, 141, 142, 149 

Bell Inn, Gloucester, 17 

Benson, Bishop, ordains Whitefield, 28; admonishes White- 
field, 105 

Bishopsgate-street Church, Whitefield preaches in, 33 

Blackstone, Sir William, on preaching in London churches, 44 

Boardman, Richard: sent to America, 204; meets White- 
field in America, 213 

Bolingbroke, Lord, and drinking, 39; warns a recreant 
clergyman, 44 

Boston, Whitefield’s first visit to, 140-142; Whitefield’s 
second and subsequent visits to, 144-147 

Bristol, Whitefield’s preaching successes, 48 

Butler, Bishop, on unbelief in England, 42; and doctrine 
of the Holy Spirit, 92 


Charity Schools in England, 53 

Charity School in Philadelphia, 157, 158 

Charles II and reaction from Puritanism, 37 

Chesterfield, Lord, and Whitefield’s preaching, 174 

Children, Whitefield disciplines, 75; Whitefield’s influence 
over, 77; Whitefield’s letters to, 78, 84, 85; love of for 
Whitefield, 79 

Clergy, English in eighteenth century, 43, 44, 91 


Dartmouth College and Whitefield, 215 
Drake, Sir Francis, and his ships, 57 
Drinking in England, 39 

219 


INDEX 


Edwards, Jonathan, and the Great Awakening, 137; visited 
by Whitefield, 142; cautions Whitefield, 144 
Exeter, New Hampshire, 206 


Foote, Samuel, and “The Minor,” 199 

Francke, Professor, and orphanage at Halle, 81 

Franklin, Benjamin, friendship with Whitefield, 151-154, 
155, 156, 186 

Free Will Baptists and Whitefield, 214 


Gambling in England, 40 

Garrick, David, comment on Whitefield’s voice, 162 

George III on Whitefield and the Wesleys, 96 

Gillies, Doctor, describes’ Whitefield’s appearance, 33 

Gladman, Captain, converted on shipboard, 67 

Gloucester, England, Birth-place of Whitefield, 17; White- 
field preaches there, 29, 48 


Harvard College and Whitefield, 141, 147, 148 
Hooper, Bishop, scene of martyrdom, 17 

Horne, C. Silvester, 112 

Hume, David, and Whitefield’s preaching, 174, 175 
Huntingdon, Countess of, and Whitefield, 120 


Immorality in England, 40 
Jails, English, 31, 32 


Limerick, kindness of Bishop of, 67 

Lindsay, Captain, and his ship, 57, 58 

London, crime in, 38; and Whitefield’s preaching successes, 
49, 50 


Marriage-scandals in England, 41, 42 

Methodism, first introduced in England by Whitefield, 52; 
in America, 204 

Mohock Club in London, 38 

Montesquieu, on irreligion in England, 43 

Moorfields and Whitefield’s preaching, 105, 106 

Morris, Samuel, uses Whitefield’s sermons, 178 


New Birth, doctrine of in eighteenth century, 92; and 
Whitefield’s preaching, 52, 95, 142, 143, 213; doctrine of 
220 


INDEX 


in Colonial America, 137-139; as preached by John 
Wesley, 94 
Newburyport, Massachusetts, 206, 208 
New England and Whitefield’s ministry, 144, 146, 147, 205 
New York and Whitefield’s ministry, 148, 149 


Oglethorpe, General, governor of Georgia colony, 79 

Orphanage in Georgia, need of, 80; erected, 81, 82; rules of, 
82, 83; name of, Bethesda, 82; religious work in, 83, 84; 
indirect results from, 85, 86; later history, 87; public 
collections for, taken by Whitefield, 109, 153, 154 


Parsons, Jonathan, 208 

Philadelphia and Whitefield’s ministry, 127, 150 

Pilmoor, Joseph: sent to America, 204; meets Whitefield 
in America, 213 

Pilot-fish, lesson from, 68 

Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 206 

Princeton College and Whitefield, 149, 150, 215 


Quakers and Whitefield, 150, 188 


Raikes, Robert, and first Sunday Schools, 17 
Randall, Benjamin, converted under Whitefield, 214 


Saint Mary de Crypt Church, 29 

Savannah, Whitefield’s first visit to, 79 

Scougal, Henry, and Whitefield’s conversion, 24 
Ships in eighteenth century, 59 

Slavery, Whitefield’s attitude toward, 135, 136 
Smalley, Doctor, recollections of Whitefield, 164 
Stoddard, Solomon, on an unconverted ministry, 138 


‘Tabernacle in London, 110 
Tennent family, 139 
‘Tennent, Gilbert, 139 
Tennent, William, and conversation on death, 201, 202 
Theater, in eighteenth century England, 41 
“The Holy Club,” Oxford, 22, 138 
Toplady, Augustus, on unconverted clergy, 43 
Tottenham Court Road Chapel, 111, 112 
Tyndale, William, birth-place, 17 
221 


INDEX 


University of Pennsylvania and Whitefield, 158 


Walpole, Horace, 38 

Walpole, Robert, and drinking, 39 

Watts, Isaac, on English Dissenters, 43 

Wesley, Charles, boyhood advantages contrasted with 
Whitefield’s, 17; befriends Whitefield at Oxford, 22; in 
Georgia, 47, 80 

Wesley, Charles, Jr., and George ITI, 96 

Wesley, John, boyhood advantages contrasted with White- 
field’s, 17; befriends Whitefield at Oxford, 22; missionary 
in Georgia, 47, 51, 52, 80; unwise advice to Whitefield, 54; 
preacher of the New Birth, 94; relations with Whitefield, 
184, 185; and field-preaching, 104; preaches Whitefield’s 
funeral sermon, 210, 211 

Wesley, Samuel, and the preaching at Epworth, 92 

Whitefield, George, born, 17; youthful sins, 18; student at 
Saint Mary de Crypt School, 19, 20; bartender, 19; early 
love for dramatics, 19; his grandfather, 20; servitor at 
Pembroke College, Oxford, 21; austerities at Oxford, 23; 
conversion, 24; ordained deacon, 29; preaches first ser- 
mon, 29; visits to the Oxford jail, 31, 33; supply curate 
at the Tower of London, 33; appearance, 33, 34; receives 
degree at Oxford, 31; embarks first time for America, 54; 
first voyage to America, 60-65; first return voyage to 
England, 65, 66; third voyage to America, 69; letter- 
writer, 69; his son, 76; field-preacher, 103, 104, 107, 108; 
prodigious worker, 113; assailed by mobs, 114; in Scot- 
land, 116-118; in Wales, 118; in Ireland, 118, 119; among 
the nobility, 120-123; mother of, 18, 20, 27, 193, 194; wife 
of, 70, 194-196; sermons, 168-178; catholicity of soul, 
187, 188; humility, 188, 189; personal habits, 190-193; 
burlesqued, 199, 200; poor health, 200, 201; last sermon, 
206, 207; death and funeral, 209, 210 

White, William, recollections of Whitefield, 204 

Whittier, lines on Whitefield, 160 

Wilberforce, William, converted under Whitefield, 214 

Winter, Cornelius, recollections of Whitefield, 165, 190-193 


Yale College and Whitefield, 145, 147, 148 


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